Four Spring Firefighters Share Firefighter of the Year Honors from the 100 Club

By Hannah Falcon

In the chaos of an unprecedented natural disaster, four Spring firefighters jumped into rushing flood waters to answer their call to duty and are now being recognized for their heroism.

Because of their heroic deeds during the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, the Houston 100 Club honored Michael Alaniz, Hamilton Ledkins, Richard Rakus and Kevin Wise, all firefighters from the Spring Fire Department, as Firefighters of the Year at the 64th Annual 100 Club Heroes Awards Banquet on Wednesday, May 16.

Strong currents going different directions created dangerous swift waters that capsized two kayakers during the flooding caused by Hurricane Harvey. Ledkins, Rakus and Wise responded to the scene. When they arrived, one kayaker had capsized and was clinging to tree branches, according to Ledkins.

“We put a rescue boat in the water, Richard Rakus and myself, to go downstream to get to [the capsized kayaker], unfortunately the water was moving a little too fast to go about the way we were going to try to originally, so we had to come back, reevaluate the situation,” Ledkins said. “Well, at that point in time the other kayaker capsized and they went underwater so we didn’t have any more time to think about what we were going to do, so we had to act fast.”

As Ledkins operated the fire department’s inflatable boat, Rakus pulled the kayaker into the boat and they took him to shore. In order to rescue the other kayaker, Wise stepped in to drive a boat through rough waters with Rakus.

“We tried throwing some rope to him through the trees from a safer area, but the rope wasn’t able to get to him. We went a little further into the current and kind of made a pendulum on a tree and from there we were able to throw a rope to him and pulled him back into the boat,” Wise said. “The boat wasn’t strong enough to go straight against the current and we were also in a little whirlpool area so we had to fight three different currents to get back across the street.”

On the second day of Hurricane Harvey, Alaniz rescued six young people from floodwaters on Treaschwig road. In the heavy rain, Treaschwig turned into a rushing river with strong currents that trapped five people holding onto the roof of a submerged pickup truck and one hanging onto a telephone post. The area was very isolated, so when Alaniz responded to a water rescue call, the fire department’s boat could not reach the people. Luckily, a civilian nearby was able to aid the rescue.

“There was a civilian with his own personal boat that happened to be locked in the same area that we were. He started loading his boat in the water, I guess to take it upon himself to try to help,”
Alaniz said. “I didn’t have time to speak to command to let him know what was going on because he was already pushing off into the water so I told him and a few of the firefighters around us ‘Hey, I’m jumping into the water to go help him out!’”

Once Alaniz and the civilian safely reached the flood victims, they were able to pull them all into the boat and take them to dry land. This brave feat was one of the many rescues Alaniz and his colleagues performed during the hurricane.

“It was a long week. Everyone there did a lot of work. No one took a day off besides to come back and sleep just to go back out as soon as they woke up. But like I said, I wasn’t expecting much of a reward besides just doing my job. The crew I was with, there was three of us, we were on that truck for 36 hours,” Alaniz said. “I wasn’t really expecting much more than a thank you and a good job.”

Hannah Falcon is a sophomore Communication major at Texas A&M University. A Staff Writer and Life & Arts Editor for the Texas A&M Battalion, Falcon is spending the summer as a volunteer writer for Spring Fire Community News.