It started around 3:30 a.m. Blaring sirens breaking the silence of night. Flashing lights invading people’s homes. A heavy fog of smokiness violating the clean, early morning breeze.
The fire was so immense it lit up the block as if it were daytime.
By the time Jasin Lulanaj got there, one house was completely on fire and another was just starting to catch. A third house, still untouched, would not be for long. The flames were shooting through the roof and through the sides of the houses. It was so hot he could feel the heat through his gear.
His team responded with two ladder-and-engine trucks, but the flames had created burning hot spheres around the houses.
“There was a young man who was on the second floor,” recalls Lulanaj, a volunteer firefighter in Elmsford, New York, a normally quiet town in Westchester County. “He was trapped up there.”
The chief rolled up his car and parked outside the second house. The young man jumped onto the top of the car, spraining his ankle.
The firefighters proceeded to surround the house and douse it with water. They tried to save the second house, but it became fully engulfed with fire. It took nearly seven hours to extinguish all of the flames. The third house was the only one they could save.
No one had slept that night. People were running late to work, and Lulanaj remembers school buses changing their route that morning.
“That was one of the craziest fires I’ve ever been to on a regular night call,” Lulanaj says. “I was feeling a little scared yet excited at the same time, but I remember going without hesitation.”
When Lulanaj goes on these calls, he never knows what the situation will be. There’s always a little concern, but that also makes him more aware of his surroundings. Since the outbreak of the coronavirus, he’s no longer as confident as he once was when responding to a call.
When Lulanaj gets commercial fire alarms (which are usually false alarms) or alarms at hotels, motels, and warehouses, he has normally responded without any uncertainty. He’s usually one of the first guys on the ladder truck. Recently, he has begun to have second thoughts.
His fire pager rings and a muffled voice comes in from the police department, announcing “KKG 536 to all Elmsford fire personnel, fire apparatus needed for a carbon monoxide alarm.”
But only three firefighters answer the call. Under regular circumstances, twice as many firefighters would have responded.
“The chief responds very quickly, but the firefighters take longer,” Lulanaj says. “They’re hesitant.”
Often, fire calls relating to carbon monoxide are false but this time, it wasn’t. Everyone in the house needed to be evacuated.
There was always unpredictability on these calls, but now, the virus has added palpable anxiety.
“I should’ve been on that call, but I didn’t make it,” he says. “For the first time in my life, when the calls come in, I’m very hesitant to go.”
Lulanaj came to the profession as a young adult. “I never saw myself as a firefighter,” he says. “I wanted to become a firefighter because I wanted to help people. It just came down to that.”
A close friend of his had been doing it for a couple of years while Lulanaj was still in college. His friend wouldn’t stop talking about it. He spoke about all the things that he was doing both as a firefighter and while operating the ambulance.
“That’s what piqued my interest,” Lulanaj says. “That’s when I decided that what I wanted to do was help people during emergencies.”
He remembers that before he began his training and going on calls, he always felt unsure of himself and his future.
At the time, he was working to help pay off his tuition while studying to be a history teacher. He was starting his new job as a high school sub, but a part of him wanted to go to business school to pursue property management like his father and brother.
Despite his efforts, he was persuaded by his father to pursue a different career path––one less “stressful” and not as “high maintenance.”
“I wish I would have told him that business was what I wanted to do. That I wanted to help them and get involved with what they were dealing with,” Lulanaj says. “I was less sure of myself and afraid to stand up for what I wanted back then.”
That’s when firefighting presented itself as an option.
“It was something I finally decided for myself. I took control of what I wanted, and it felt good,” he says.
Lulanaj was taught everything about fires––how they react to certain situations and how to deal with people in need during a house fire or car accident. The more he learned, the more he saw it as something what he was meant to be doing all along.
The training showed him how to help people in need, and that gave him motivation to face difficult situations, not just in an emergency, but also in his personal life. He realized what his abilities were and how to deal with his fear and insecurities.
“It helped me become a more confident person,” said Lulanaj.
If it were up to his family, he wouldn’t be a firefighter at all, but it has never made him reconsider being a volunteer. He feels he was meant to do this, but since the outbreak, he has become increasingly frustrated. He has developed a fear he’d never experienced before.
“We have no idea if the virus is at a location or if we’ll become infected by answering the fire call,” Lulanaj says. “Many things are running through my head about safety for myself and the fire guys with me.”
His gear now includes special gloves and a mask; sometimes he’ll even put on his Scott Air pack just to breathe from his tank. The mask seals around his entire face and brings him a sense of relief when he feels anxious about going somewhere that the virus could be present.
“People out there are still getting into car accidents and the ambulance is still going on runs bringing people to the hospital with COVID-19 related symptoms, and I just don’t know what else to do,” Lulanaj says. “I hate that I can’t be there to help people the way they need to be helped.”
After 16 years of answering calls, he’s been hanging back more often. Every time he does, he feels guilty.
“In the end, I know those people need my help and the help of my fellow firefighters,” he says. “But we’re doing the best we can.”
