WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) — Firefighters and first responders from across Kansas gathered in the Air Capital on Sunday to attend the 25th annual Kansas Fallen Firefighter Memorial.
Former and current firefighters traveled the distance to pay their respects to the fallen. It was Michael Mire’s first Kansas memorial as Wichita’s new fire chief.
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He may be in a new state, but Mire said the pain of losing a crewmate is felt across departments.
“In 2013 alone, I was a part of coordinating 24 line-of-duty death funerals,” he said. “Two in Bryan, Texas, four that we had in Houston, Texas, and then 19 Granite Mountain Hotshots who were killed in the line of duty in Arizona. So, I’m all too familiar with that experience.”
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To open the ceremony, Tammy Roth read a poem written by her grandfather after his retirement from the Wichita Fire Department in the 1940s…