Personal Injury Law

Firefighter alcohol abuse a national concern

By Steve Lombardi

Firefighter alcohol abuse a national concern
by Doug Bates
The Oregonian
Saturday September 13, 2008, 10:39 AM

The Oregonian's recent editorial series "Death of a Firefighter" has touched off a nationwide online discussion in the fire service community. The response illuminates the fact that alcohol abuse among firefighters has been a growing concern in the profession for some time. Typical is the following posting on a Web site called FirefighterCloseCalls.Com:

THE ISSUE OF BOOZE AND PARTYING IN OUR "BUSINESS" CONTINUES TO HAUNT US

This is multi-day-series article about 20-year-old firefighter Shannon Halvorson and how some describe that her fellow volunteer firefighters killed her. During a night of what we all know to be "typical firefighter conference/convention" partying, at a motel five years ago, they got the underage girl so wasted that she should have been hospitalized. This happened at a fire service conference -- the Oregon Volunteer Firefighters Association convention.

Some of you may write back telling us that she should have been more responsible, etc etc. Don't waste your e-mail. Bottom line: Be it in a home, a bar, a party or at a conference or convention, if an individual isn't responsible, then those hosting, sponsoring or watching the event have to take charge and be responsible -- or someone's kid ends up dead. That's the issue. Death prevention...again. Sort of a Brotherhood/Sisterhood thing.......but often we end up thinking: B.M.A. (Brotherhood My A**)

Here, here and here are more such national sites where the discussion has been flourishing:

--Doug Bates, associate editor

Some of you may have already been following this piece directly from the Oregonian newspaper. But in case you haven't, I wanted to pass it along. It is about another tragic booze related death of a firefighter with her brother and sister firefighters ...this time at a firefighter conference. Twenty-year-old Shannon Halvorson got beyond seriously wasted at a motel party and she ended up dead ...and her grieving dad has been fighting for years for some accountability in the loss of his daughter.

If you drink as an underage teenager read this story and watch the YouTube video. I've previously written (here and here) about how much a young adult can drink before dying, this story should demonstrate to you how situations can escalate that result in a person dying.

For five days this week and two of the next week we will reprint, with permission, a story published by The Oregonian about Shannon Halvorson, an underage firefighter who died not through the line-of-duty, but under less than clear circumstances while at a training conference of the Oregon Volunteer Firefighters Association. The words and reporting is credited to The Oregonian. We wish to thank the Associate Editor, Doug Bates for granting us permission to do so and for Shannon's father, Dick Zimmerlee, whose tireless efforts will not let this matter rest until justice is done.

Full post as published by Des Moines Personal Injury Lawyer on March 23, 2009 (boomark / email).