When Commitment Calls

David Spalding is well into his second career as a nurse. Now, at age 40, he has been working almost a year in the transitional open-heart unit at Lehigh Valley Hospital (LVH)–Cedar Crest, part of Jefferson Health, and is in the Nurse Residency Program. He is also a volunteer firefighter in the Upper Macungie Fire Department, with connections to fire departments in Lackawanna County, where he used to live. It was this connection that made him aware of a fire that broke out the night of Feb. 4 at Lehigh Valley Orthopedic Institute, the building right next to LVH–Dickson City. Always wanting to be “the guy that goes in and helps,” Spalding didn’t hesitate to respond.

As a volunteer firefighter, I have an app that alerts me to fires in my designated area, and from my previous areas in Throop and Olyphant. That night, I was home, watching the New York Knicks barely beat the Denver Nuggets, and I got an alert.

Listening to the conversations, I could tell it was a large fire – not simply a toaster or microwave. There was a call for extra help, and then the chief issued an evacuation tone. I got in my car and drove an hour and 15 minutes to Dickson City with my phone on Bluetooth the whole time. I knew it was going to be an all-nighter.

I was one fireman out of many that night. The guys there initially had the brunt of fire to deal with. I was on the crew that went back into the building to look for pockets that were still smoldering. We were on the roof and on the first floor, at times wading through two feet of mucky water, with “irons” and poles to rake through the debris.

I was there six hours, but the guys who were on-site first were there a lot longer. They’re the kind of people who run toward catastrophe to help; they don’t run away from it. They didn’t try to rush through and get home either; they stayed and did the job. That was amazing. 

These situations really clarify what’s important. It was LVHN – my company. There were patients there. And my fellow firefighters may have been in trouble and needed help. That was all I had to know. 

The fire department is already like a brotherhood and a family. The feeling is something perhaps only we in firefighting and EMS know – being on the back of a truck, sirens blaring, going to help people on the worst day of their life. It’s wanting to be the guys to go – to get there and take care of them – that always connects us.