Firefighters honoured at recognition ceremony in Quebec City

Ironically, it was for an operation at sea that Johnatan Brunet, director of the Fire Department of the City of Matane, received a cross of courage, which honours the accomplishment of a heroic act at the peril of his life, during the ceremony held by the Ministry of Internal Security Sunday afternoon in Quebec City for the National Day of Recognition of Firefighters.

“Interventions like these give meaning to the profession, and above all, generate a lot of pride in being part of a team of professionals like the one with whom I was able to carry out this rescue,” said Brunet, who has 23 years of experience as a firefighter, in an interview with The Canadian Press.

On a stormy Friday evening in mid-November 2024, off the coast of Matane, in the Gaspé Peninsula, a sailor on a cement ship suffered an internal hemorrhage. 

Tadoussac, where the Canadian Coast Guard station is located, is too far away for mariners to intervene. Stormy conditions are keeping rescue helicopters grounded. No fishermen are in the vicinity. 

Called around midnight, the director acted quickly. He gathered firefighters Kevin Isabelle and Francis Bélanger, contacted the Canadian Coast Guard Auxiliary to obtain a vessel suited to the situation, piloted by John Ted Savage, and the crew set out to sea. “That night, if there hadn’t been four of us on board, we wouldn’t have made it,” Brunet emphasized.

On November 15th, the river had already frozen over, and the marina was closed. After breaking through two hundred meters of ice to reach the open water, Brunet and his team reached the boat in 1 hour and 15 minutes, amidst five-meter-high waves and dense fog. 

It took the crew three attempts to rescue the sailor. The rescue boat being much smaller than the huge cement ship, the latter lowered the injured man using a winch, the safety brake of which had been engaged. 

The boat sustained damage, with the cruise ship’s hull hitting theirs during the first two attempts. And the waves, which caused the boat to rise and fall five meters each time, made it difficult for rescuers to reach the stretcher. 

Kevin Isabelle clings on so that he can cut the straps holding him when the boat comes up, leaving him in the void at arm’s length, until he can cut them, and be caught in mid-air with the stretcher by the boat’s crew, during a third attempt, which would have been the last. 

The sailor was rescued, transported to the port where ambulances were waiting, and survived his injuries. It is this return journey that remains etched in Brunet’s memory. “The satisfaction of a job well done as a team, of being able to hand over to the paramedics a person who was still alive, who was at risk of dying if the delays had dragged on,” he said. “It’s impossible not to be emotional at that moment.”

Having an easy sacrifice

Twelve members of a fire safety service and four citizens were decorated at this event organized by the Ministry of Internal Security to highlight the remarkable actions they have taken in fire safety in Quebec.

Among these four citizens, Sylvain Mireault, Director General of the Quebec Association of Fire and Civil Safety Managers (AGSICQ), has forty years of public service. He was awarded a commendation for these four decades, recognizing his contribution to the development and promotion of fire safety. 

“You have to be willing to sacrifice easily,” says Mireault, “to be a firefighter. When you get a call, when you have to go and do a rescue at sea in a dangerous operation, like those in Matane, you go anyway,” at the risk, but avoiding at all costs that it be at the cost of your life, he emphasizes. 

After spending several years as a firefighter in the Quebec City and Montreal fire departments, Mireault rose through the ranks to become a division chief, a position he held until his retirement in 2018. 

Between yesterday and today, Mireault believes that one of the biggest changes has occurred in the area of ​​health and safety at work. 

“We went in headfirst, with the technical knowledge, to fight the fire, but without thinking too much about our health,” he said. “We are much better protected today, and more aware of the risks.”

Upon his retirement, he took the position of Director General of AGSICQ, where he successfully led several initiatives, such as holding women’s seminars to cement the place of women in the firefighting profession, or expanding the role of his organization to include civil security, and thus recognizing the role of firefighters as first responders in pre-hospital care. 

“We don’t do this job for recognition. We do it to really help, to serve people, more than anything else,” he said. 

–This report by La Presse Canadienne was translated by CityNews