MICHAEL DUGGAN
AN UNEXPECTED REUNION FF/P Michael Duggan tells Adam Hyland about his coincidental connection to the vintage fire truck that came from Long Island this summer.
T
he last issue of Firecall featured a story about vintage fire engine collector Liam Moore’s project to bring an old fire truck from New York to Dublin. While many might have read this with interest, for A Watch Donnybrook FF/P Michael Duggan, news of this endeavour was a real blast from the past because he actually had first-hand knowledge of Glen Cove’s Ladder 5211, having helped out the volunteer fire department in the Long Island community back in 1990. Michael had heard a few snippets of information about a vintage fire truck coming to a private owner in Dublin, but it wasn’t until he watched a video of its arrival that he started to put two and two together, and realised it was the very truck he had seen in action more than 30 years ago.
COINCIDENCE “It’s the kind of story you see in the media, like those ones where someone rescues a person from a fire many years ago and now they are reunited,” he tells me. “My friend and colleague Willie Bermingham, who has his own old DFB appliance, had brought his into our station in Donnybrook to
SUMMER 58 FIRECALL
Michael Duggan is reunited with the vintage fire truck from Glen Cove.
clean it one evening because he was planning to meet the US fire truck on its arrival, and while I gave him a hand, he told me about it, but I didn’t pay much attention to it because it could have been any truck coming from anywhere. “He mentioned Glen Cove, and I thought, that’s amazing, it’s the same station I was at when I was in America many years ago, but I didn’t think in
my wildest dreams that it would end up being the very same fire truck I was on over there, so I said to him to enjoy the day, and forgot all about it. “That next day, one of the other members of the Watch went down to the quays with his family to watch the fire truck and escort go by, and he put up a video on our WhatsApp featuring the DFB engines accompanying this old US truck when it arrived off the
