The Florida Times-Union
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — One family lost a father and the Jacksonville Fire and Rescue Department lost a brother Tuesday night, friends and family said.
Firefighter Christopher C. Swary, 43, was the apparent victim of a fiery rear-end collision with a JEA tanker-style truck that was slowing to collect traffic cones on the ramp for University Boulevard North about 11 p.m., according to the fire department and Florida Highway Patrol. His personal Chevrolet Tahoe sport-utility vehicle hit the back of the truck and burst into flames.
Final identification is still pending confirmation.
Swary was assigned to Engine 11 on Talleyrand Avenue and had been a firefighter since January 2002, fire department spokesman Tom Francis said.
A Wednesday morning email by the department stated with “profound sorrow” that Swary would always be remembered for his “unparalleled dedication to the JFRD as well as to the community he felt privileged and honored to serve.”
Fire Chief Kurtis Wilson added his condolences “with a heavy heart” on the department’s Fallen Firefighter Memorial Facebook site.
“Please have your thoughts and prayers with Chris and his family and please give some time for the family to gather their thoughts,” he wrote.
Swary, whose Facebook page is adorned with photos of two young daughters, becomes the first firefighter to die since 43-year-old Ladder 4 engineer Neal Tarkington suffered a heart attack after leaving the station in late 2008.
“He was a fine gentleman and a great firefighter and had a heart of gold,” said Randy Wyse, International Association of Firefighters Local 122 president. “Any fire station is like a family and it would be just like losing a brother, and that is what he was, a brother. ... His family is grieving and his firefighter family is grieving, and we will support those families.”
Fellow fire engineer Sheryl Rodgers said Swary supported her when she was battling cancer, even having his head shaved at St. Baldrick’s Foundation events to raise funds for childhood cancer research. She said he also helped her get through some tough days when she was getting chemotherapy treatments, and now he’s gone.
“When I wasn’t feeling well he stepped up and he would drive and he would help around the station, saying ‘Don’t worry about the chores,” Rodgers said. “He was always doing above and beyond.”
News of the crash also prompted dozens of condolences on the Jacksonville Firefighters Death Benefit Fund Facebook page. Veronica Bula called him “an incredible man” who loved his family and shaved his head each year to raise funds for children cancer treatment.
“It was an honor to know him and work with him,” Bula said.
The memorial photograph of Swary shows him wearing a pink T-shirt in front of a pink fire truck from the Pink Heals Movement, which was started in 2007 to help people battling cancer. Wyse said that was just another way that Swary supported Rodgers at Station 11 in her battle with cancer.
“It was unbelievable how the station and department helped her, but he really helped her,” Wyse said.
Swary may not have become a firefighter until 2002, but he began working in 1995 at Baptist Health’s security department, then became a flight communications specialist, hospital officials said. His Facebook page says he studied to be a paramedic at Florida State College at Jacksonville’s Fire Academy of the South.
He became a Jacksonville fire engineer while he worked as a certified nursing assistant from 2000 through 2004 at Wolfson Children’s Hospital’s emergency room, according to hospital spokeswoman Vikki Mioduszewski. He continued to work multiple jobs and returned to Wolfson’s ER from 2005 to 2012, where Mioduszewski said staff were still struggling with what happened.
Wyse said he and other firefighters met with Swary’s family to offer their support as well as help with funeral preparations, adding that “we will send him off with all the honor he deserves.”
JEA spokeswoman Gerri Boyce said she could not comment on specifics of the wreck, which is being handled by the Highway Patrol. But in a statement, she said the utility follows standard safety protocol after any incident and will do its own safety investigation.
JEA truck driver Quincy McFadden Cromer, 48, and passenger Anthony Jerome Dallis, were not hurt, according to the Highway Patrol.
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