\u201cThe first day was tough, but the second was even harder,\u201d Losada, who has an 11-year-old son who he\u2019d call each morning before getting to work, said. \u201cIt was a feeling that really, deeply affected me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Day two was also the day that reminded Torres of his work at Ground Zero. <\/p>\n
\u201c\u200aWe were calling out to see if we can hear anybody. We yelled out, \u2018Is anyone there? Please say something\u2019 and we heard a woman scream, her last breath, \u2018Help.\u2019 So we heard it, [but] we never got to her,\u201d he said. \u201cUntil today, I have a problem with that because you train all the time to try to do something. Now, a person’s there, but you just don’t know how deep they’re in this pile.\u201d <\/p>\n
Eventually, the Rescue 4 Tunnel Rats grew to an 18-man team. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe primary objective was always to help and to hold onto the hope and faith that someone was still alive,\u201d Losada, who has worked as a firefighter for two decades, said. \u201cWe had several indications that this was the case, but unfortunately, given the passage of time and the sheer volume of debris, by the time we reached the individuals, they had, of course, already passed away.\u201d <\/p>\n
Watching Jim\u00e9nez, Losada and the rest of his team work to restore hope \u201cwas like art,\u201d Torres told the Eagle. <\/p>\n
They were dubbed the \u201cTunnel Rats\u201d after U.S. soldiers who would venture into tunnels during the Vietnam War and fight Viet Cong soldiers in hand-to-hand combat. <\/p>\n
\u201c\u200aThese guys are like tunnel rats \u200abecause they were going into holes without even checking, or going, \u2018Oh, you be careful,\u2019” Torres said. <\/p>\n
As the rescue efforts wound down, Torres brought his crew to the Big Apple and Jackson Heights, a neighborhood that is home to roughly 135,000 Colombians. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe initial purpose was to knock on doors, getting the chance to learn more and to see how we can return to Colombia and what more we can do for the community at large \u2013 through training and by advising people on what to do in the event of any emergency, not just the kind we experienced,\u201d Losada said about his visit. “Hopefully, people will listen to us a bit more now and understand the importance of knowing how to handle situations that inevitably arise during an emergency.\u201d <\/p>\n
While in New York, the Tunnel Rats visited FDNY Engine 292\/Rescue 4 on Queens Boulevard, where they did some visual training. Then, Torres took them to the Fire Academy on Randall’s Island called \u201cThe Rock,\u201d where they met with probationary firefighters and received special operations and camera search training, while also sitting in on some small lectures.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey visited a lot of firehouses and saw all the equipment they have, so they can do some comparison to what they have and give them an idea of how far they can go if they have the right resources,\u201d Torres said.<\/p>\n
Beyond the trip, \u200aJim\u00e9nez said that he felt Torres had given the group \u201ca lesson in humility and humanity.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cI didn’t know that I could contribute and here I was eager to learn, eager to help, and make my own small contribution to our community,\u201d \u200aJim\u00e9nez said. \u201cComing here, sharing experiences, walking through the doors opened to us, and seeing things firsthand, marks the start of a long journey toward gaining knowledge that could be incredibly valuable for our families and our communities.\u201d <\/p>\n
While the Tunnel Rats may no longer be operating the way they were in the weeks after the earthquake, the group\u2019s work has continued. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re in the process of finding ways to keep helping because they still need it,\u201d Losada said. \u201cEmergency response isn’t over, it\u2019s ongoing, yet many people overlook that.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a call not just to rescuers, firefighters, and emergency personnel, but to the community as well,\u201d he added. \u201cThere is still so much left to do.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThe first day was tough, but the second was even harder,\u201d Losada, who has an 11-year-old son who…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":374666,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,122,124,123],"class_list":["post-374665","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374665","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=374665"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374665\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/374666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=374665"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=374665"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=374665"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}