''Fire Fighter'' is a fireboat which served the

New York City Fire Department The New York City Fire Department, officially the Fire Department of the City of New York (FDNY) is the full-service fire department of New York City, serving all Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs. The FDNY is responsible for providing Fi ...

from 1938 through 2010, serving with Marine Companies 1, 8 and 9 during her career. The most powerful diesel-electric

fireboat A fireboat or Fire-float Pyronaut, fire-float is a specialized watercraft with pumps and nozzles designed for fighting shoreline and shipboard fires. The first fireboats, dating to the late 18th century, were tugboats, retrofitted with ...

in terms of pumping capacity when built in 1938, ''Fire Fighter'' fought more than 50 major fires during her career, including fires aboard the in 1942 and the in 1943, the 1973 collision of the '' Esso Brussels'' and SS ''Sea Witch'', and the terrorist attacks on

September 11, 2001 The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...

Service history

Authorized for construction in early 1937 by Mayor

Fiorello LaGuardia Fiorello Henry La Guardia (born Fiorello Raffaele Enrico La Guardia; December 11, 1882September 20, 1947) was an American attorney and politician who represented New York in the U.S. House of Representatives and served as the 99th mayor of New Y ...

based on designs submitted by noted naval architect William Francis Gibbs and his firm

Gibbs & Cox Gibbs & Cox is an American naval architecture firm that specializes in designing surface warships. Founded in 1922 in New York City, Gibbs & Cox is now headquartered in Arlington, Virginia. The firm has offices in New York City; Washington, D.C. ...

, ''Fire Fighter'' was laid down at United Shipyards as Hull #856 and was christened and launched on August 28, 1938, by Eleanor Grace Flanagan. After fitting out and sea trials, ''Fire Fighter'' officially entered service with the

at 9:00 a.m. on November 16, 1938, with Engine 57 at Pier 1 at the Battery, which would later be organized as Marine Unit 1. Serving from this post through the mid-1960s, ''Fire Fighter'' would respond to two of her most famous actions; the fire and capsizing of the in 1942 and the fire aboard the ammunition-laden in 1943, among dozens of other vessel and pier fires across

New York Harbor New York Harbor is a bay that covers all of the Upper Bay. It is at the mouth of the Hudson River near the East River tidal estuary on the East Coast of the United States. New York Harbor is generally synonymous with Upper New York Bay, ...

. Shifting with the majority of commercial steamship line freight operations from

Manhattan Manhattan ( ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City. Coextensive with New York County, Manhattan is the County statistics of the United States#Smallest, larg ...

to the

Brooklyn Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...

waterfront, ''Fire Fighter'' served with Marine Unit 8 and Engine 223 at the 37th Street Pier through 1967 before shifting once again to the Homeport Pier in Stapleton where she joined Marine Unit 9, an assignment which made her the first-due marine firefighting asset at the heavily trafficked Narrows of New York Harbor and throughout the tight confines of both the

Arthur Kill The Arthur Kill (sometimes referred to as the Staten Island Sound) is a tidal strait in the New York–New Jersey Harbor Estuary between Staten Island (also known as Richmond County), New York, and Union and Middlesex counties, New Jersey. It ...

and

Kill van Kull __NOTOC__ The Kill Van Kull is a tidal strait between Staten Island, New York (state), New York, and Bayonne, New Jersey, Bayonne, New Jersey, in the United States. It is approximately long and wide and connects Newark Bay with Upper New York ...

. With both waterways already heavily utilized by marine traffic calling at ports on the

Chemical Coast The Chemical Coast is a section of Union and Middlesex counties in New Jersey located along the shores of the Arthur Kill, across from Staten Island, New York. The name is taken from the Conrail Chemical Coast Line, an important component in th ...

, the rise of both the Port Newark-Elizabeth Marine Terminal and

Howland Hook Marine Terminal The Howland Hook Marine Terminal, operating as Port Liberty New York, is a container port facility in the Port of New York and New Jersey located at Howland Hook in northwestern Staten Island, New York City. It is situated on the east side of ...

saw an increasing number of

container ships A container ship (also called boxship or spelled containership) is a cargo ship that carries all of its load in truck-size intermodal containers, in a technique called containerization. Container ships are a common means of commercial intermodal ...

transiting the same waters. These conditions led to several major vessel collisions and shoreside fires during her tenure in Staten Island, but the 1973 collision of '' SS Esso Brussels'' and SS ''Sea Witch'' would prove to be the largest fires she would ever fight single-handedly. For her and her crew's part in the response, firefighting and rescue of 31 surviving crewmen from the burning SS ''Sea Witch'', the ''Fire Fighter'' was named a Gallant Ship and her crew received the American Merchant Marine Seamanship Trophy. To date, ''Fire Fighter'' remains the only fireboat to have received this award. A 1974 article in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' described how fires in

New Jersey New Jersey is a U.S. state, state located in both the Mid-Atlantic States, Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern United States, Northeastern regions of the United States. Located at the geographic hub of the urban area, heavily urbanized Northeas ...

frequently resulted in requests to the FDNY commissioner for the loan of ''Fire Fighter''. Once authorized it would take ''Fire Fighter'' approximately 45 minutes to arrive at waterfront communities such as Carteret. The boat, as ''Firefighter'', was declared a U.S.

National Historic Landmark A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a National Register of Historic Places property types, building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the Federal government of the United States, United States government f ...

in 1989. and On

, ''Fire Fighter'', along with the rest of the FDNY Marine Units, responded to the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and took up a station at the foot of Albany Street in

Battery Park City Battery Park City is a mainly residential planned community and neighborhood on the west side of the southern tip of the island of Manhattan in New York City. It is bounded by the Hudson River on the west, the Hudson River shoreline on the nor ...

and began pumping at her maximum capacity to supply water to landside units fighting fires in the still-standing towers. Following the collapse of both buildings and resultant failure of the majority of the water mains serving lower Manhattan, ''Fire Fighter'' and the rest of the FDNY Marine Units became the sole source of water for firefighting efforts at

Ground Zero A hypocenter or hypocentre (), also called ground zero or surface zero, is the point on the Earth's surface directly below a nuclear explosion, meteor air burst, or other mid-air explosion. In seismology, the hypocenter of an earthquake is its p ...

, a duty which ''Fire Fighter'' maintained for a period of three weeks until sufficient repairs were completed on landside water mains to permit her release from what had become her longest emergency response call. Following a shipyard period in 2003 to rebuild her worn-out engines, the ''Fire Fighter'' resumed her post and continued to respond to marine emergencies, including a gasoline barge explosion in Port Mobil, Staten Island, in February 2003, and to the ditching of

US Airways Flight 1549 US Airways Flight 1549 was a regularly scheduled US Airways flight from New York City's LaGuardia Airport to Charlotte and Seattle, in the United States. On January 15, 2009, the Airbus A320 serving the flight struck a flock of birds shortl ...

on the

Hudson River The Hudson River, historically the North River, is a river that flows from north to south largely through eastern New York (state), New York state. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains at Henderson Lake (New York), Henderson Lake in the ...

in 2009. Replaced in frontline service by the fireboat '' Fire Fighter II'', in 2010 at Marine Unit 9, ''Fire Fighter'' was placed into reserve status at the former

Brooklyn Navy Yard The Brooklyn Navy Yard (originally known as the New York Navy Yard) is a shipyard and industrial complex in northwest Brooklyn in New York City, New York (state), New York, U.S. The Navy Yard is located on the East River in Wallabout Bay, a se ...

where she remained in FDNY custody until October 15, 2012. Transferred on that date to the ownership of the non-profit Fireboat Fire Fighter Museum, ''Fire Fighter'' is now operated by an all-volunteer group dedicated to preserving the historic fireboat in running condition as a

museum ship A museum ship, also called a memorial ship, is a ship that has been preserved and converted into a museum open to the public for educational or memorial purposes. Some are also used for training and recruitment purposes, mostly for the small numb ...

, befitting her over 70 years of service to the people and mariners of

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

and

As a museum ship

Under the stewardship of the museum, ''Fire Fighter'' found a home in Greenport, New York, on Long Island's North Fork and relocated to the village from the

in February 2013. Eventually shifting to the village's commercial pier in accordance with their contractual agreement with the village, the museum has continued to grow in popularity and was granted

501(c)(3) A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, Trust (business), trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of ...

status by the

IRS The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is the revenue service for the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government, which is responsible for collecting Taxation in the United States, U.S. federal taxes and administerin ...

in October 2013 as a tax-exempt non-profit organization. The museum was awarded a National Park Service Maritime Heritage Grant in 2014 to pursue hull upkeep and preventative maintenance shipyard work. Gathering matching funds for the National Park Service grant lasted through December 2016, when ''Fire Fighter'' reported to Goodison Shipyard in

Kingston, Rhode Island Kingston is a village and a census-designated place within the New England town, town of South Kingstown, Rhode Island, South Kingstown in Washington County, Rhode Island, Washington County, Rhode Island, United States, and the site of the mai ...

, for four months of shipyard work, overhaul and hull inspection. Completed in April 2017, ''Fire Fighter'' returned to Greenport, New York, in her as-built, late 1930 FDNY color scheme, with a black hull, white topsides and buff smokestack, and with all topside brass returned to its bare metal appearance. As of the summer of 2021, the vessel is currently on exhibit at the

Mystic Seaport Museum Mystic Seaport Museum (founded as Marine Historical Association) is a maritime museum in Mystic, Connecticut, and the largest in the United States. Its site holds a collection of ships and boats and a re-creation of a 19th-century seaport vill ...

in Mystic, CT.

Photo gallery

File:Fireboat Firefighter Engine Room.jpg, Fire Fighter's engineering space containing her four DeLaval 5,000gpm fire pumps, twin 16-cylinder 1500HP main engines and electric propulsion motors File:Fireboat Firefighter - One of Fireboat Firefighter 's smaller 2,000gpm monitors. -.JPG, One of Fire Fighter's smaller 2,000gpm monitors, located on her fore Portside top deck File:Fireboat Firefighter 's water monitors during September, 2014 Greenport Water Display.jpg, Fire Fighter 's water monitors in operation File:Fireboat Firefighter 's Engine Room Telegraph.JPG, Fire Fighter's original 1938 engine order telegraph File:Pyrometer from Fireboat Firefighter 's Engine Room.jpg,

Pyrometer A pyrometer, or radiation thermometer, is a type of remote sensing thermometer used to measure the temperature of distant objects. Various forms of pyrometers have historically existed. In the modern usage, it is a device that from a distance de ...

from Fire Fighter's Engine Room File:Builder's Plate from FDNY Fireboat Firefighter.jpg, Fire Fighter's Builder's Plate File:One of four two-stage centrifugal DeLaval Marine Fire Pumps on Fireboat Firefighter.jpg, One of four 5,000gpm two-stage centrifugal DeLaval Marine Fire Pumps. File:Nameplate for one of Fireboat Firefighter 's 600V DC Marine Motors.jpg, Builder's plate for one Fire Fighter's Westinghouse Electric motors File:Engineer's console in Fireboat Firefighter 's Engine Room, used to control almost the entirety of the ship..jpg, Chief Marine Engineer's control console File:Port engine of Fireboat Firefighter 's installed power system, she has Twin V16 1500HP Winton Diesel Engines of which power a diesel-electric system.jpg, Port side 16-cylinder GM/Winton Diesel Engine File:Big Bertha & the bow of the Firefighter.jpg File:FDNY Fireboat Firefighter at shipyard in primer.jpg File:FDNY Fireboat Firefighter's National Landmark Plaque.jpg File:Fireboat Firefighter.jpg File:FDNY Fireboat Firefighter during 2016-2017 shipyard work. .jpg

References

External links

Museum Website

Official Greenport Village Website

"Fire Fighter" Youtube video of 2003 rechristening and operation on the water

{{National Register of Historic Places in New York National Register of Historic Places in Suffolk County, New York Southold, New York Ships on the National Register of Historic Places in New York (state) National Historic Landmarks in New York (state) Fireboats of New York City 1938 ships Museum ships in New York (state) Ships built in Staten Island