by PATRICK GALLAHUE and MARK BULLIET
The fire union blasted the city yesterday, charging that an antiquated FDNY rig contributed to a Bravest's near-fatal East Side road tumble — as sources told The Post the door latch nearest to him was loose.
Months ago the Uniformed Firefighters Association complained to department brass that new firetrucks were on the shelf waiting for maintenance "requiring older and in some cases unsafe rigs to be kept in service," union president Steve Cassidy said yesterday.
"Taxpayers should be furious with the caliber of equipment the Fire Department is forcing its firefighters to operate with," Cassidy said. "Putting old and unsafe rigs and safety equipment on the streets endangers the lives of firefighters and civilians alike."
On Friday night, three-year firefighter Joseph Moore, 26, tumbled off an antiquated rig from Ladder Co. 13 as it was racing to a blaze on the Upper East Side. The firefighter, whose parents are retired from the NYPD, was sitting in the rearmost seat and was apparently putting on his gear when he fell from the truck.
Moore, who was in and out of consciousness yesterday, fractured his skull and remained in critical condition. He was expected to recover.
Sources said the door on the side of the truck that Moore fell from was loose, and it didn't have an extra latch like the doors on the other side. But a fire official claimed the door and latch "tested fine" and was "not faulty."
The firetruck, a 1988 Mack Tower Ladder, is a model that was being phased out because of past similar mishaps, sources told The Post.
"A firefighter almost lost his life responding to a Manhattan fire as he was ejected from an unsafe and almost 20-year-old firetruck," Cassidy said. "How can it be that in a city with an annual budget of over $55 billion, that the lives of firefighters and the citizens we are sworn to protect depends on apparatus built in the 1980s when Ed Koch was mayor?"
An FDNY official said the truck was taken out of service as the department investigates the accident.
A spokesman said the old rig was in service only because Ladder Co. 13's regular ladder truck was being repaired and that it had been in service for three weeks.
In September, WCBS/Channel 2 aired an exposé revealing that brand-new trucks were breaking down and the maintenance com pany, Seagrave, had fallen badly behind schedule in repairing them, forcing the city to put older trucks on the street.
Firefighters rallied around Moore, a former lifeguard from Far Rockaway, who was at New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center yesterday.
"He's in and out," said one firefighter. "You just have to pray."
Additional reporting by Angela Montefinise & John Doyle Back To Top
MORE TRUCK TROUBLES FOR EAST SIDE FIRE COMPANY
By TOM LIDDY
A day after a firefighter's skull was cracked in a fall from an aging replacement firetruck, his Upper East Side company experienced a vehicle malfunction with yet another replacement rig.
The ladder on the latest truck assigned to Ladder 13 was stuck in an upright position for over an hour last night as the firefighters responded to an alarm.
Mechanics found that the truck's aerial lock was bent — which could have sent the ladder whipping through the air had the hydraulic system failed.
"The city doesn't care," fumed a Ladder 13 member who requested anonymity. "We've got terrorist threats, and we're running around with 20-year-old rigs."
The company was responding to reports of a fire at 117 E. 89th St. at about 8 p.m. Fortunately, the small blaze had been put out by the time the ladder on the 1991 Seagrave Straight Ladder got stuck. No one was on the ladder at the time.
But the incident comes on the heels of Friday's accident, which left Joseph Moore, 26, in critical condition after tumbling to the street while donning his gear in the back seat en route to a fire.
A source said the 1988 Mack Tower Ladder had been phased out precisely because firefighters had fallen out in the past.
The door was loose and lacked an extra latch, according to sources, although an FDNY spokesman disagreed, insisting that the latch was fine.
The firehouse was using the 1988 Mack model as a replacement for its usual truck, which was being repaired.
The FDNY declined to comment on what happened last night. Back To Top
BABY-RESCUE DRAMA
By GEORGETT ROBERTS
An FDNY veteran clambered three stories up a ladder to a smoke-filled Brooklyn apartment and broke through a window to grab a baby yesterday, in a fire that left a tenant dead of a heart attack.
"See the firetruck!" plucky 23-month-old Jalil Gardener said after the dramatic rescue by Ladder 112 Firefighter Thomas Hoey.
Hoey, a 27-year veteran, was helped by Robert Grabher of Engine 214 at the Bedford-Stuyvesant home.
Jalil's trapped mom, Jenay, and grandmother, Jennifer Jules, could not get out because of steel bars on the window. They were finally escorted safely from the four-story building at 272 Madison St. by firefighters.
First-floor tenant James Earle Jackson, 67, died of a heart attack — moments after pleading with firefighters to save his own son on the top floor of the building, where the blaze started in a first-floor hallway about 3 a.m.
The son, Darryl Jackson, 39, said he saw his father being wheeled away to an ambulance — and got a last look at his dying dad.
"I heard my father shouting to the fireman, 'My son is upstairs,' " the younger Jackson said. "They said, 'OK, we'll take care of it.' "
The elder Jackson was taken to Wyckoff Heights Medical Center.
Little Jalil also was taken to the hospital, but information on his treatment and condition was not available. Neighbors said the baby appeared unharmed when he was reunited with his tearful mom.
Hours after the blaze, Hoey was back on the job, recounting the early-morning drama. The blaze was under investigation.
"I was about to put the [ladder] on the roof when I saw somebody at the third-floor window," said Hoey, a father of three. "There was smoke."
He said he smashed through the window and scooped Jalil from the person inside, clutching the baby to his chest while he tried to pry off the window guard to allow the trapped people inside get to the ladder.
"I was trying to take the gates out," he recalled. "The mother said, 'How are we going to get out of here?' I said, 'Just give me the baby.' The mother passed the baby to me.
"I had the baby in one hand and was trying to get the gates out with the other."
But he couldn't manage it, he said.
"I couldn't move the bars, so I asked for help. Bob [Grabher] took the baby." Back To Top
BRAVEST TEAM DELIVERS
By LORENA MONGELLI
A frightened Brooklyn woman with an early-arriving bundle of joy got some special-delivery help from New York's Bravest yesterday.
Jonathan Gonzalez was born a mere five minutes after firefighters from Engine Company 248 showed up at mom Rita's Linden Boulevard home to help with the birth.
Gonzalez was caught off-guard when she suddenly went into labor just before 1 p.m. — and called 911. The firefighters were the first emergency responders to arrive.
"She said she didn't know it was gonna happen this fast," said Firefighter Pat Jack, 26. "She was very surprised."
When the woman answered the door to let in the emergency team, her labor was already far along, he said.
So far, in fact, that she was starting to give birth in the fourth-floor hallway outside her door, said a firefighter.
"We tried to encourage her," said Jack. "We sat her down on the floor. She was definitely scared."
Luckily, she was in good hands. And her son didn't keep them waiting very long.
"Once I heard the baby start to cry, I was very relieved," said Jack.
The firefighters cleared the baby's airways, cut the umbilical cord and wrapped him in a blanket before an ambulance arrived to take the mother and her newborn to the hospital.
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