By Lisa Boykin Batts
The Wilson Daily Times
ROCK RIDGE, N.C. — Every time the fire whistle sounded, Landen Bass ran outside and stood at the white fence that separates his yard and the Rock Ridge Volunteer Fire Department. As the firefighters headed out on the fire truck, Landen stood and waved and gave them a thumbs-up.
Landen loved the RRVFD, and the firefighters loved him back.
“They always treated him like a little brother, like part of the fire department, really,” said his mother, Kristie Bass. “There was just that special bond.”
Landen and his parents moved next door to the fire station almost four years ago, and he quickly became involved with the station, from helping in the yard to painting fire hydrants red.
He listened on Monday nights when the fire whistle blew to call members to the weekly meeting. He watched them drive their pickup trucks up to the station and quickly learned which truck belonged to each volunteer.
It was those same firefighters he looked up to who raced to the scene of an accident last Saturday afternoon that claimed the life of their little buddy.
‘LANDEN WAS TRAPPED’
Early Saturday morning, 11-year-old Landen was over at the firehouse helping out with the annual barbecue chicken fundraiser. But later in the day, he took his friends John Hinnant and Samuel Woodall on an all-terrain vehicle ride to the Contentnea Creek that runs behind the Basses’ house. The boys wanted to fish.
When it was time for them to come home, Kristie called Landen on his cellphone. Soon after, she walked outside the house to look for them and saw John running up from the creek and toward the fire department.
He was wet, Kristie said.
“Where’s Landen?” she asked. John told her he was in the creek. She screamed for help, and the firefighters came running.
When they got to the scene, they found the vehicle in the water. Samuel and John were able to get out, but Landen was not.
“Landen was trapped,” Kristie said.
Firefighters jumped in the water and tried to free Landen, but had to cut the seat belt to get him out.
Landen was unresponsive, but the firefighters did CPR and revived him. Landen’s father, Brian, said EMS continued care and got him to the hospital.
They worked on him as rapidly as possible, Brian said.
“We just got the most unbelievable care from everybody,” Kristie added.
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A medical helicopter took Landen from Wilson Medical Center to Vidant in Greenville.
Landen didn’t have any internal injuries or outward signs of injury.
“We and the doctors always had hope,” Kristie said.
But he couldn’t recover from the time he spent underwater and died on Wednesday morning.
Brian and Kristie say they are forever thankful for the few extra days they had with Landen. They sat with him in the hospital room, cuddled with him, spent time with him.
“For that we are grateful,” she said.
Family members climbed in the hospital bed with him and snuggled next to him. Brian and Kristie sat by his side and read to him the many handmade cards from his friends and classmates.
The cards have sweet notes, Bible verses and drawings.
One reads: “P.S. I cried too.”
Brian and Kristie credit John and Samuel for getting to the department so quickly to get help and the firefighters who revived him.
“It means the world to us, honestly,” she said.
They said the two boys gave them the opportunity to have a few more days with their only child.
“They did all the right things,” she said, adding they did what they needed to do.
“It could have been worse.”
SWEET CHILD
Kristie and Brian describe Landen as a sweet, gentle soul. He knew no strangers.
Landen asked a lot of questions, and he loved the outdoors.
They said it was difficult, at first, for him to adjust to his new home in Rock Ridge, but after around six months, he realized how nice it was to have open fields to roam on family land.
“He just found his niche,” Kristie said, and came to embrace everything in the tight-knit Rock Ridge community.
That community included Marsh Swamp Free Will Baptist Church, just down the road from his house.
Landen loved to light the candles at the church altar before services started and reveled in his chance to usher during a recent youth service. He also enjoyed sitting in the sound booth.
Landen learned about God in church and at Wilson Christian Academy where he attended until this school year. He was a fifth-grader at Rock Ridge Elementary at the time of his death.
“He had a love for Jesus,” Kristie said, and enjoyed reading his Bible.
Kristie said Landen had a servant’s heart and always enjoyed doing things for people.
“His life might have been short, but from the day he was born, he lived it every day to do something for others.”
He was a little helper to his aunt Wendy Davis and her girls, who lived just across the street from his house.
Davis said Landen kept a watch on the house for her and did whatever yard work she needed, including cutting her grass and pulling up bushes.
Landen enjoyed cutting grass and started up a landscaping business with his friend D.J. Scott. They even had business cards printed.
PART OF THE BROTHERHOOD
Landen was the same way at the fire department — wanting to help.
Capt. Ashley Barnes said he was always asking what needed to be done, from moving tables and chairs to pulling weeds in the flower bed that surrounds the flag pole. That flag is flying at half-staff in the child’s honor.
“He just became part of us,” he said. “He was just like one of our junior firemen.
“He was just special to us.”
One year, Landen asked for a scanner for Christmas because he wanted to keep up with the firefighters and what they were up to.
When he first moved to Rock Ridge, when the fire whistle sounded for a fire call, Landen pulled out a Halloween costume and put on his own set of fire gear — including pants, boots and a pager he inherited from his granddad, Morris Lamm, who was a Rock Ridge volunteer.
Barnes said Landen reminded the firefighters of themselves as children — loving the outdoors and waiting until the day they could be firefighters.
On Wednesday, the rescue truck from Rock Ridge escorted Landen’s body back to Wilson. At overpasses along the way, firefighters stood watch at the bridge.
“We owed him something because he had given so much to us,” said Assistant Chief Jim Miller.
Miller described Landen as everyone’s little brother.
“He was a part of the Rock Ridge Fire Department as far as everyone was concerned. He was a member of our organization.”
Landen will be missed at the firehouse.
“We did lose one of our own,” Miller said. “Firefighting is a brotherhood, and he was a brother to every one of us.
“It’s so hard to lose him, especially under the circumstances. He touched so many lives in so many ways.”
Landen will be given fallen firefighter honors at his burial Saturday.
COMMUNITY REACHES OUT
The Basses have been touched by the outpouring of love and concern for their family.
“The entire community has wrapped its arms around us,” Kristie said.
They appreciate the cards, calls, visits and prayers and the red ribbons that people tied to their doors to show their support.
Landen loved N.C. State, and he loved the color red.
On Friday afternoon, the Rock Ridge Elementary family gathered outside and released red balloons in memory of their classmate.
“Brian and I could not imagine people who do not know him are touched by him and his spirit,” Kristie said.
“I grew up in this community, and I’ve never seen anything like this. He was definitely a kind soul, and people saw that.”
Landen didn’t like to see people sad and did whatever he could to make them happy. He was always positive, “a glass half-full kind of guy,” his mama said. “Nothing about him was mean-spirited.”
Brian and Kristie are remembering that in these difficult days.
Kristie said if he could, Landen would tell them, “Get up; let’s get outside.”
“He didn’t like people to be sad,” she said.
So that’s what they are doing. Trying to follow what he would have wanted.
“It’s what keeps us upright,” Kristie said.
Landen’s funeral is 11 a.m. Saturday at Joyner’s Funeral Home. He will be buried at Marsh Swamp Church.
Visitation is Friday from 5 to 8 p.m. at the funeral home.
Copyright 2017 The Wilson Daily Times