The firefighters coming under fire themselves
Amid rising attacks on emergency services personnel, Joe Shute talks to those under fire while saving lives
When Steve O’keefe and his firefighting colleagues prepare for a night shift at Fairweather Green Fire Station in Bradford, he admits that it is akin to heading into battle. Aside from the usual threats faced by firefighters on any given evening, there are new and very real dangers to take into account on the streets of West Yorkshire.
“We’ve become hardened to it sadly,” says the 31-year-old watch commander, who has been a fireman for 10 years. “Bricks and stones, verbal abuse, fireworks… it’s part of the job and it’s all year round.”
One of the most recent – and shocking – assaults on O’keefe and his colleagues occurred earlier this month, when their engine was ambushed before Bonfire Night. The crew took shelter inside, as fireworks were smashed into the side and fired underneath the wheels. The force of the rockets was enough to leave large dents in the side of the vehicle.
“For me, that was one of the most nerve-racking attacks,” says O’keefe. “We thought ‘if one of those fireworks makes it through the window it is going to cause serious damage’.” Bradford is by no means alone in witnessing this rise in violence, and firefighters are not the only branch of the emergency services to be subjected to such vicious assaults in the line of duty. Attacks on Britain’s firefighters have increased by 18 per cent over the past two years, while over the past year there have been 26,000 assaults on police officers and 17,000 on NHS staff. They are particularly vulnerable during the winter months, as nights get longer and darker.
Earlier this week, footage emerged of a female Metropolitan Police officer being “kung-fu” kicked into the path of an oncoming London bus as she assisted with an arrest. Fortunately, the vehicle swerved out of the way and the officer escaped serious injury, but it was an eye-opening insight into the additional dangers faced by those who have devoted their careers to keeping the rest of us safe.
The footage – posted online under the headline ‘South London at night… Lol’ – has sparked wide condemnation, not just for the severity of the attack, but also the bystander who laughingly filmed it without making any attempt to help. In response, Ken Marsh, chairman of the Metropolitan Police Federation, warned: “We’re going to come to a point where we’re going to start telling our colleagues: ‘Risk-assess it dynamically.’ ”
Britain’s firefighters have already reached that stage and are now regularly being forced to abandon attempts to put out fires after coming under sustained assault, often by mobs of teenagers. Earlier this month, the Fire Brigades Union said there had been 933 incidents involving an attack on firefighters in 2017-2018 – up by 194 on the previous 12 months.
This month, a trial has started in Tyne and Wear, with some crews wearing body cameras to record footage of the perpetrators, as evidence to use in court.
According to Steve Bewick, watch manager at Marley Park Community Fire Station in Sunderland – whose crew was pelted with bricks, bottles and fireworks on Bonfire Night – from October this year, there have been around 13 attacks on firefighters throughout Tyne and Wear, including a punch being thrown at one in the Byker area of Newcastle.
“It’s a massive increase on what we used to get,” said the 49-year-old, who has been a fireman for 18 years. “I think it will only be a matter of time before a firefighter will be injured.”
Those on the front line are baffled at why the attacks are increasing at such a startling rate.
According to the unions, years of government cuts have been an aggravating factor, due to community engagement projects being slashed and fewer firefighters being available. But social media has been another catalyst. Invariably, the acts are filmed on smartphones and quickly uploaded to Twitter, Facebook and Youtube. Few of the culprits seem to show any fear of retribution, although from this month a new Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Act has come into force – doubling the maximum penalty for those who assault a member of the emergency services from six months to a year in prison.
“We are in this online ‘likes’ culture, where things are done for the approval of people you don’t know,” says Andy Ellis, watch manager at Moortown Fire Station in Leeds. “And there seems to be this sweeping disrespect for all the emergency services.”
Like many of his West Yorkshire colleagues, the 34-year-old has also been attacked on duty.
On Hallowe’en, he and his crew were called out to a bin fire in Leeds when they were fired upon with a rocket, which narrowly avoided hitting them and exploded off a nearby wall. They were forced to retreat from the scene. Then, minutes later, while on their way to another fire, the team heard over the radio that their colleagues were being attacked with bricks. In total, the brigade recorded five separate violent incidents on that night alone.
“It is scary,” says Ellis. “It’s easy for me to sit here with a load of bravado and say it doesn’t bother me, but it does. I notice my mental health changes around this time of year, when the attacks are increasing. It’s a little anxiety that hangs over me about what might happen.”
This year, the Telegraph’s Christmas Charity Appeal is supporting the Fire Fighters Charity, which provides physical and mental health support, and rehabilitation to firefighters as well as their families.
Ellis has required the charity’s services several times, using its respite centre in Penrith to help with rehabilitation from physical injury, and says it has proved a lifeline. Knowing there is support available is also a huge source of comfort.
“There is a lot more mental health awareness and support available now,
‘I think it will only be a matter of time before a firefighter will be injured’
‘There have been 933 attacks this year – up by 194 on the previous 12 months’
which is fantastic,” Ellis says. “It’s the realisation the trauma we deal with doesn’t go away.”
Firefighters in the worst affected areas say it is not so much their own safety they are as worried about, as the potential impact upon their families.
O’keefe has two children, aged two and 10, and says he finds it reassuring to know that his family will be supported by the Fire Fighters Charity should he be injured in some way as a result of an attack.
But he says that his ultimate wish is that, by engaging the worst-affected areas and emphasising that there are real people behind the uniforms, those carrying out the attacks will, in time, change their ways.
After the spate of Hallowe’en incidents, West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service even issued a video of a fireman publicly appealing for the violence to cease, saying: “All those who work in the fire service are all fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, brothers and sisters.”
“That is what we keep trying to get across to the community,” O’keefe says. “That we are people with families who are just trying to keep the public safe.”