On 10th anniversary of Black Sunday, survivors remember lost FDNY brothers

POSTED 8:55 AM, JANUARY 23, 2015, BY MARY MURPHY, UPDATED AT 09:09AM, JANUARY 23, 2015

(PIX11) – Exactly 10 years after six FDNY firefighters were forced to jump from the top floor of a Bronx apartment building — their escape from raging flames blocked by illegal partitions — three survivors gathered Friday to remember the brothers they lost that morning.

TO SEE VIDEO IF NOT APPEARING: http://pix11.com/2015/01/23/on-10th-anniversary-of-black-sunday-survivors-remember-lost-fdny-brothers/

Jan. 23, 2005 came to be known as Black Sunday because firefighters were killed in two different boroughs — the same morning — during blizzard conditions.

Curtis Meyran and John Bellew died that morning, after jumping out fourth floor windows in the Bronx while battling a blaze on East 178th Street. Richard Sclafani lost his life while on a fire call in Brooklyn.

Nearly seven years after Black Sunday, Joseph DiBernardo, known as Joey D, succumbed to the debilitating physical and emotional wounds he suffered that day when he was forced to jump in the Bronx.

On the 10th anniversary, Joey D’s partner from Rescue 3, Jeff Cool, recalled how DiBernardo wrapped Cool’s personal safety rope around his arm and told Cool to go down first, because Jeff was a husband and father of two small sons and DiBernardo was single.

Cool held onto the rope for a short time before it broke and he fell the rest of the way. He is now retired from the FDNY.

Firefighters Brendan Cawley and Eugene Stolowski from Ladder 27 in the Bronx remain on the job, 10 years after the fateful jump. Both have been on remarkable odysseys since Jan. 23, 2005.

Cawley was just four weeks out of the FDNY Academy — a probie — when he watched a wall of fire racing toward him on the fourth floor. He once told PIX 11 News that Curt Meyran and Stolowski gave him the courage to go out the window.

Cawley suffered lung and rib injuries in the jump. His family had already endured a devastating loss in the 9/11 terror attacks, when Cawley’s brother, Michael, also a firefighter, was killed in the collapse of the Twin Towers.

Eugene Stolowski survived the jump, but within days, it became apparent he was paralyzed from the neck down. His skull separated from his spine.

At the time, Stolowski was the father of a little girl. He underwent risky surgery to fuse his vertebrae. His twin daughters were born in April 2005, while Stolowski was doing rehabilitation at Rusk Institute in New Jersey. By late August 2005, Stolowski was walking again.

After the Black Sunday fires, the FDNY revived its policy of providing personal safety ropes to each of its firefighters.

A criminal case in the Bronx ended with a jury acquitting two tenants of criminally negligent homicide for putting up partitions that blocked the fire escapes. The tenants were creating more units to generate income.

A Bronx judge later overturned a conviction against the building’s manager.

On this 10th anniversary, Brendan Cawley said it was important to focus on the lives lost and the families who lost precious time with the men they loved.

John Bellew was the father of four children. Curtis Meyran was a dad to three. Richard Sclafani and Joey DiBernardo had so much left to live for, and families that still deeply mourn their loss.