Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
Barclay Friends first responders get help
Barclay Friends fire highlights first responders crisis support team
Firefighters who battled the deadly Barclay Friends blaze are getting help dealing with after-effects.
The Barclay Friends fire in November saw an unprecedented level of response from emergency teams who saved numerous lives. But for those who responded, it has had a cost, namely emotional stress. To help them deal with the stress of that evening, more than 100 emergency personnel, from firefighters to dispatchers, took part in debriefings with the Chester County Critical Incident Stress Management (CISM) Peer Support Team reports (CISM) Peer Support coordinator Jerry Schwartz.
“This was a historic fire for West Chester. Few have been as extreme as this,” said Schwartz, who is also the chaplain for the West Chester Fire Department. “The fire was so intense and the number of occupants was so overwhelming.”
Schwartz said the stories first responders shared help them cope with the event. There were so many stories of one frail person after another, it overwhelmed them in so many ways. An example of scenes firefighters shared included a lady in one room reading a book as the fire blazed overhead. They told her, “you have to leave.” She replied, “But I’m reading my book.”
First responders told Schwartz of bringing out one gentleman who was half naked, “We needed to cover him up and show some humanity.”
“It became untenable on the second floor. They got to a point where they couldn’t do anymore,” recalled Schwartz. “Something like that was hard to take in.”
“The police, fire(fighters), EMS and neighbors – it was just a amazing scene. A sense of the helplessness, to see all these people covered up,” Schwartz said. “Rescuers feel good about all the people we got out of there, but still not making that last rescue affected responders.”
“The stereotype of ‘you’re weak if you ask for help’ – we are chiseling away with that,” he said. After the Barclay’s fire, one of the captains from Fame, Bill Cummings, opened up about his stress from the Barclay Friends fire. “Sometimes, there is an emotional relief (with CISM). He’s a better man for it. Sometimes you need help.”
“I felt Bill’s experience would help a lot of people,” said Schwartz. “As a human being, it has an effect on you. People have different personalities, but if you are a human being it will have an effect on you.”
“Most everybody has recovered well from Barclays; we followed up on a few people, but none of them needed any professional help.” Schwartz said. “I have had other incidents where I still work with people years later.”
Schwartz, a retired Baltimore City Fire firefighter, knows about the stress. After nearly 20 years in Baltimore, including as a captain in one of the nation’s busiest stations, he moved to West Chester to become a pastor at a new church in West Chester. The church, Living Faith Church, began services at Fame Fire Company banquet hall. Once firefighters learned of his past career, they welcomed him on board.
Chester County’s CISM team has been active for over 20 years with a team of more than 30 members including police, firefighters, medics, dispatchers, and mental health professionals and chaplains. Schwartz said it is modeled on a process used around the world. The program is voluntary; first responders don’t have to talk if they don’t wish.
“The team works peerto-peer. They know the culture and can talk the talk. It is not a critique,” Schwartz said. “We call it a debriefing to facilitate a normal recovery for people who have experienced
an abnormal experience. It’s not just one incident but it’s the cumulative effect because the types of things first responders deal with on a regular basis. They then go home to a family and try to be normal. These responders take it all in and store it somewhere, but at some point that storage gets filled and overflows.”
Schwartz told of one police officer who asked for help after dealing with the death of a young boy. It wasn’t that traumatic, but the paint color and wall border of the room was the same as his son’s room and that memory stuck with
him.
“Things trigger memories that come back to haunt you,” Schwartz said “Images that run around in their head sometimes for days. It has to do with memories. It’s an ongoing process in knowing what to do. The teams are there to help and keep them from developing PTSD.”
Schwartz said alcohol is not the answer and can only make things worse.
The CISM team uses a number of techniques. One is a debriefing 48 hours after the event to give them time to process and to let responders give their thoughts and share there their story. Another method is defusing, a more dramatic event which is held immediately after the scene. Following a
knife attack at courthouse a few years back, a team was assembled and went right to the courthouse immediately.
Schwartz said stress for volunteer personnel is no different than for other career personnel. These volunteers are on call all the time. “You may see more in a city fire department, but I have seen more horrific accident experiences here than my career in Baltimore,” Schwartz said. “There are far too many accidents in Chester County.”
“We don’t want first responders to come to a place where things are out of control,” Schwartz said. “If they are not able to shake it, we get them additional help. We’re just there to support them.”