Honoring Spring Firefighters who Served in the Military
By Hannah Falcon
(Photo: Marcos Dacunha)
May is military appreciation month and the Spring Fire Department is a home away from home to many who have served or continue to serve our country. Those who felt called to serve in America’s armed forces also found a calling in firefighting. After risking their lives in war zones, they now protect Spring.
(Photo: Marcos Dacunha)
Firefighter Marcos Dacunha continues to serve in the U.S. Army as a combat medic and paratrooper. Dacunha became a firefighter because to apply his combat medic training and follow in his father’s footsteps as a Spring Firefighter.
“When I was little I always watched military movies with my father and I liked watching stuff blow up and saw people jumping out of airplanes and I wanted to do that, so that’s why I became a paratrooper,” said Dacunha who finds the same excitement and adventure in being a firefighter.
(Photo: Brent Silvey)
Brent Silvey, Army Intelligence, said he enjoys working with people of different backgrounds in the Army and firefighting.
(Photo: Shawn Babendure)
Spring District Chief Shawn Babendure served in the 11th Armored Calvary Regiment. Brent Silvey served in army intelligence and enjoys working with people of different backgrounds in both the army and firefighting.
(Photo: Jordan Hendricks, U.S. Marine Corps)
It’s not just the Army. Spring Fire is home to many U.S. Marines as well.
Phillip Dunne, a former marine gunner, found the action and brotherhood he experienced in the military in Spring Fire. He adds the teamwork required in the military is similar to the teamwork needed for first responders.
(Photo: Jordan Hendricks, U.S. Marine Corps)
“No matter what you’re doing, no matter what kind of call it is you have to be a well-oiled machine. Everybody needs to know what everybody is going to be doing and do what you’re supposed to be doing,” Dunne said. “When you do that, everything runs like clockwork. It gets done efficiently, quickly, safely.”
(Photo: Tyler Gardner, U.S. Marine Corps)
Dunne adds he gained an appreciation for America through the Marines. “You always hear that America is the land of the free, but you never really know what that means. It’s not ‘til that freedom gets stripped from you that you know what it is you have here in America,” Dunne said. “The little things that you come to appreciate.”
Cedric Allen was a general’s aid during Desert Storm/Desert Shield. He found working with the transportation officers similar to working as a first responder.
(Photo: Tyler Gardner, U.S. Marine Corps)
Spring Fire Captain Walter Juarez joined the marines because he was born in Guatemala and felt the need to earn his way to American citizenship. “I was going down the wrong path,” Juarez said. “So my time in the Marine Corps has shaped my life. I try to live my life everyday as I was taught in the marines.”
Juarez believes firefighting helped him a brotherhood similar to that in the Marines. “Once I had a little taste of it, I found it to be the same as it was in the Marine Corps. The brotherhood that we have, the love for one another that we have, that you really can’t find in the civilian world,” Juarez said. “We get along, we fight, we argue, we pick on each other, but at the end of the day we’d do anything for each other.”
(Photo: Kenny Eisfeldt)
Firefighter Kenny Eisfeldt decided to be a marine straight out of high school JROTC. He knew he wanted to continue a life of service when he left the marines, so firefighting was a natural choice.
(Photo: Kenny Eisfeldt left)
Like most firefighters and veterans, Eisfeldt feels uncomfortable accepting excessive praise. “I can take somebody coming up to me and saying ‘good job,’” But, Eisfeldt added, “It’s still hard for me to call myself a hero because I’m not, because I have a lot of brothers that gave a lot more than me.”
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.