By Susan J. Park and Kim Edds
The Orange County Register (California)
Copyright 2006 The Orange County Register (California)
All Rights Reserved
FOUNTAIN VALLEY, Calif. — Hundreds of firefighters from across the state joined family and friends of Pablo Cerda in Santa Ana Tuesday to mourn the 23-year-old Fountain Valley firefighter.
Mourners at St. Barbara’s Catholic Church watched a presentation showing Cerda growing up through the years before making a solemn procession of firetrucks and engines made its way to Good Shepherd cemetery in Huntington Beach.
Firefighters from Fountain Valley and Huntington Beach hoisted a giant American flag between two ladder trucks as Cerda was laid to rest.
Meanwhile, a fund has been established in the memory of Cerda, the U.S. Forest Service firefighter who died from his injuries received during the Esperanza fires.
Cerda lived in Fountain Valley with his father and sister, according to neighbor Kim Goodwin. Goodwin says Cerda moved back home with his family following the unexpected death of his mother from a brain aneurysm around seven years ago.
Cerda, 23, was just beginning a career as a firefighter, a dream he had since his high school days, playing on the Los Amigos soccer team, where he was captain of the varsity team.
“He mentioned it early on,” said Nestor Castillo, a teammate of Cerda’s at Los Amigos. “He had the frame, the build. He was just quite a guy.”
After graduating from Los Amigos in 2001, the tall and skinny varsity soccer player spent hours lifting weights at LA Fitness and drinking protein shakes to fill out and become a solid, “little kid trapped in a big body,” said fellow firefighter Martin Ruiz
Next Cerda graduated from the three-month Fire Academy at Riverside Community College in May and planned to receive training as a paramedic. According to a friend of Cerda’s, Jaime Torres, he hoped to become a member of the Santa Ana Fire Department.
On Oct. 26, Cerda was finishing his final weeks as a seasonal firefighter for the U.S. Forest Service, and his engine received the call to fight the fires in Esperanza.
Unpredictable winds whipped the fire around their engine on a road north of Twin Pines so quickly that protective tents couldn’t be utilized, U.S. Forest Service officials said. That day, Cerda was the only surviving member of his five-person team.
Five days later, Cerda died at 5:30 p.m., at Arrowhead Regional Medical Center, where he had been battling the burns that covered 90 percent of his body.