Heroism and reality collide for rescuers at train crash site

Heroism and reality collide for rescuers at train crash site

Veteran firefighters had to face the knowledge that they could not save everyone.
By Robert J. Lopez, Garrett Therolf and Scott Gold, Los Angeles Times Staff Writers
September 14, 2008
There was spaghetti on the stove at Fire Station 96 when the loudspeaker crackled. Right before dinner. Typical.

"Possible physical rescue," the dispatcher said. In firefighter-speak, it was a run-of-the-mill call that gets the emergency response rolling but usually translates into little more than a car wreck. The voice was cold, detached -- numb from the job, perhaps, but also trained to keep emotion at bay.

Los Angeles Fire Capt. Alan Barrios, a brawny, soft-spoken man and a father of three who has been in the business for 32 of his 54 years, climbed aboard his rig with two firefighters and an engineer, his entire engine company. Among the four of them, they'd been on the line for 77 years.

Four minutes after the call, just before 4:30 p.m. Friday, they pulled up to the Chatsworth house where a resident had called 911, at the end of Heather Lee Lane. Barrios could see the smoke now. He sprinted to the back of the house and stared through a chain-link fence. This was no car wreck.

"We are on scene," Barrios barked into his radio. "We have a train collision."

The rescue effort that would unfold from that moment would involve hundreds of firefighters, law enforcement officers and others and would shock the senses of even the most hardened veterans.
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