As jobs go, there are few more dangerous as a firefighter. Glorious and heroic maybe, but they put their lives on the line every single day.

After the accident Quang now works as a phone operator. Photo laodong.com

Chu Van Khanh is a case in point. At 26 years old he had his whole life ahead of him. Last Sunday he was on his way to another call out. On his way to doing what firefighters do, save lives.

Tragically before he’d even got to the scene of the crash him and his colleagues were rushing too, the truck he was in crashed as well, and he lost his life.  

The accident occurred when he on his way to save victims of a collision between a 16-seater coach and a truck. Khanh and his colleagues were dispatched to the scene to rescue the victims.

The fire truck from of Team 12 under the Hanoi’s Fire Fighting Police Department, Thanh Tri Districthad run into an opposite direction a one-way lane of the expressway with sirens and lights on.

His mother is still to come to terms with losing her son.

“I’m still in shock,” said Dang The Tang fighting back the tears after the loss of her child. “I need nothing but him; I only need my son coming back to me.”

“I need nothing but him; I only need my son coming back to me.”

Another case is Nguyen Van Quang, 23, who could no longer work as a fire fighter at the department’s Team 7 after an accident occurred in 2015.

Quang was seriously injured while fighting a fire at a plastic workshop in Ninh So Trade Village in Thuong Tín District in October 2015. Quang and his colleagues entered the building to put out the blaze but he was severly burnt.

“At first, I think it was water, but it’s not. It’s hot plastic liquid,” he said.

“When I felt my feet sticking at the floor, it’s too late,” he added.

The burns to his arms and feet were so severe he was unable to work again in the profession he loved. And he needed several months hospital for more treatment.

“I feel like the sky suddenly falling into me at that time, it’s terrible,” he said. 

Quang now worked at a phone operator at his team, admitting he misses the job he signed up to do.

Dangers await

Colonel Do Thanh Hai, head of the department’s Dissemination Office said dangers always wait for fire fighters. Fire fighters were trained to save people although there was a lot of risks.

Houses could be collapse any time; and fire could burn them any time, he said.

“But their task is saving other people and therefore incidents are unavoidable,” he said.

Data from the General Statistic Office showed more than 4,100 blazes happened across the country in 2017, killing 119 people and injuring 270 other, causing a total damage of more than VND2 trillion ($88 million).

Major General Hoang Quoc Donh, said after the accident that resulted in Khanh’s death, the department planned to co-operate with traffic police to raise the public awareness of obey traffic regulations for people as well as provide more skills to fire fighters to deal with the same situation in order to not repeat the fatal accident in the coming time. — VNS