2 Newark Firefighters Brought Years of Service to Their Final Fire
When flames raced through a huge cargo ship in Port Newark in New Jersey on Wednesday, it was not some specialized nautical team that ventured into its blazing upper decks. It was city firefighters, whose last job might have been rushing to a burning house or fallen wires, or treating someone with chest pains or helping a woman in labor.
Neighborhood jobs.
“Regular guys” — that’s what people often call firefighters who perish on the job. Two men from Newark, Augusto Acabou, 45, known as Augie, and Wayne Brooks Jr., 49, ran onto that burning ship and didn’t come back. Both regular guys, yes, but each specifically exceptional.
They were products of Engine 16 in Newark’s working-class, historically Portuguese neighborhood, the Ironbound, working in a red-brick firehouse on Ferry Street.
Source: The New York Times
