Photo By Lance Cpl. Tyler Ngiraswei | U.S. Marine Lance Cpl. Riley Remoket uses an improvised fire hose to battle a fire...... read more read more
Subscribe
DARWIN, NORTHERN TERRITORY, Australia – With Talisman Sabre 2015 coming to a close, Marines and sailors with the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit packed up their gear and made ready to make their way from Bradshaw Field Training Area to Darwin, Australia – a two day journey by military vehicles.
About three hours into their trip, July 22, Marines in a four-vehicle convoy noticed smoke rising from a camper trailer being towed by a vehicle they passed.
“When we saw it, we originally thought it was a blown tire, but then there was a continuous line of smoke trailing it,” said U.S. Navy Petty Officer 3rd Class Benjamin L. Wood, a corpsman with Combat Logistics Battalion 31, 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit. “We called the last vehicle in our convoy over the radio and asked them if they saw it too, which they did. So we asked everybody, ‘do we pursue?’”
Everybody in the convoy agreed, so they turned around to return to burning vehicle. Besides Wood, the convoy consisted of Cpls. Pateh Tine, Nicholas G. Kenny, James J. Wiet, Michael A. Guereca, as well as Lance Cpls. Cody H. Weir, Riley Remoket, Adrian Madero and David Tippy.
Guereca and Weir were in the first vehicle to arrive on scene.
“We drove by them, flagged them down and as soon as Cpl. Guereca parked our vehicle next to their truck, I stepped out and grabbed the fire extinguisher,” said Weir, a motor transport operator with CLB-31, 31st MEU.
Guereca and Weir continued to fight the fire as the other vehicles from the convoy pulled up. Kenny and Tippy noticed that a second fire had started in the dry grass near the trailer, which was now engulfed in flames. They used whatever they could to contain the second fire: stomping the fire, kicking dirt, quickly digging up a fire trench, pulling grass out of the path of the fire and using their blouses smother the flames.
As Tine and Wiet radioed in the situation from the lead vehicle, Remoket and Madero jumped in to help the others. Wood, the one corpsman in the convoy, tended to the driver of the truck and his wife, ensuring they were okay.
Throughout the entire situation, the Marines acted independently, almost instinctively knowing what to do, according to Wood.
“There was no real leader, everybody just… clicked,” explained Wood, snapping his fingers.
At one point, they realized propane gas tanks were still attached to the camper trailer. Weir, disregarding his own safety, rushed through the flames to remove the gas tanks and throw them clear of the fire.
As Kenny and Tippy managed to extinguish the grass fire and turn their attention to trailer, Tippy and Remoket improvised with the resources they had available. They attached a fuel pump to the water tanks on one of the vehicles from the convoy and used it as a make-shift fire hose.
With an impromptu fire truck now at their disposal, the Marines made a cordon of water around the vehicle to contain the fire and then continued to battle the blaze. By this time, the fire was too big to save the trailer, so the owners told the Marines to focus on keeping the flames from spreading
Two hours into the fire, as the last of the flames were being put out and local volunteer fire fighters arrived, Wood turned his medical eye toward the Marines before they could continue their drive to Darwin. Weir had first-degree burns along his right arm and face, Tippy had first-degree burns on his ankles and everybody else walked off shaken but unscathed.
When asked why they did it, they all gave the same answer.
“Why not? It was the right thing to do.”
| Date Taken: | 07.25.2015 |
| Date Posted: | 07.29.2015 11:19 |
| Story ID: | 171421 |
| Location: | DARWIN, NT, AU |
| Web Views: | 2,866 |
| Downloads: | 3 |
This work, Marines, sailor douse camper fire on road from Talisman Sabre, by LCpl Tyler Ngiraswei, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
No keywords found.
LEAVE A COMMENT