A Montgomery County firefighter died Saturday in the line of duty, officials confirmed.
Christopher Higgins, the 46-year-old firefighter, was assisting at a house fire in Laurel, Maryland, when he collapsed and was rushed to White Oak Medical Center in Silver Spring.
Outside the hospital, the fire chief announced that the firefighter, a 22-year veteran of the Montgomery County Fire Department, died in the line of duty.
"We were responding to mutual aid for a house fire, and in during that house fire, an emergency happened within the emergency, where we had to perform cardio pulmonary resuscitation efforts to our firefighter," Montgomery County Fire Chief Corey Smedley said. "We transported him to a regional hospital, where, unfortunately, he succumbed to his medical condition."
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Just after 5 p.m., Prince George's County firefighters responded to a fire on Bradford Lane in Laurel, where they found flames shooting from what appeared to be a carport on the side of a house. Officials on the scene then asked for mutual aid from Montgomery County, which sent an engine company from its Burtonsville station.
As word spread about what happened, dozens of off-duty firefighters gathered at the hospital to console each other and to pay respect to the fallen firefighter, whose name has not yet been released.
"Montgomery County has lost one of its brave firefighters, and this is one of those jobs where every time somebody goes out, everybody understands there's a risk that they're not coming home," County Executive Marc Elrich said Saturday night. "And that's what I think makes these jobs so incredibly difficult."
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While he was a career firefighter in Montgomery County, he was also a volunteer firefighter with the Earleigh Heights Volunteer Fire Company in Severna Park, according to an Anne Arundel County Fire Department statement.
"It is with profound sadness that the BVFD shares in the grief following the loss of our brother Master Firefighter Christopher Higgins," a statement from the Burtonsville Volunteer Fire Department said. "Having begun in the fire service as a volunteer with the Earleigh Heights VFD, MFF Higgins was a 22-year veteran of the Montgomery County Fire Rescue Service and was assigned to Fire Station 15 since 2015."
As firefighters were attacking the blaze, an urgent call for help was made over the radio, asking for immediate advanced life support. The 22-year veteran of the department had collapsed on the ground and was later rushed to the White Oak hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
A procession of firetrucks and police cars escorted the body of the fallen firefighter up to the medical examiner's office in Baltimore. More firetrucks lined the overpasses on their way.