“Semper paratus” is tattooed on firefighter Peter Dekker’s tree-trunk-thick forearm. It’s his motto in Latin: Always ready. So when a report came in last Thursday about a gas leak in an apartment building in Bilthoven, he was ready.
TV segment for RTV Utrecht by Ulrike Nagel.
Normally, it’s a routine job. The Utrecht Safety Region receives reports like this quite often. But this Thursday, everything turned out differently. A gas explosion trapped Dekker and his colleagues under the rubble of the collapsed apartment building.
A week later, there isn’t even a scratch to be seen. “It’s truly amazing,” Dekker admits. “My colleague and I somehow managed to get out without any serious injuries.” Sure: a few bruises, some stiffness here and there, and a little muscle soreness. “But other than that, nothing really worth mentioning.”
No reason to panic
The day started like any other. “We were told by the dispatch center that there was construction work going on in the building, during which a gas line had been struck.” The building had already been evacuated by then. Dekker puts his team on standby and grabs his measuring equipment—oxygen meter, thermal imaging camera.
According to that equipment, there’s no reason to panic in the Bilthoven apartment building. But while Dekker and his colleagues are still checking to make sure no one has actually been left behind in the building, the first explosion occurs.
Read also: Collapsed Bilthoven apartment building still uninhabitable for weeks, may have to be demolished
“That was quite a shock. A shock wave like that really makes an impression,” Dekker says. He and his colleagues decide to ventilate the building to drive the gas out of the apartment building. But the second explosion beats them to it. Before his colleagues can even install the fan, things go wrong.
‘Suddenly, everything went black’
A huge blast. “All of a sudden, it was pitch black and we were buried under the rubble,” Dekker recalls. What goes through a firefighter’s mind at a moment like that? “First: check if you’re okay yourself. What can I still move? Then see if your colleague is responding. The hard part is that you don’t know what’s happened around you. You don’t know if you can get out.”
I’m not made of stone either. I hope it finds a place in my heart by continuing to talk about it.
Peter Dekker
Dekker’s lower legs are trapped under the rubble, but he can still move his arms. After he and his colleague manage to create some space, they’re able to free themselves and rush their way out. It’s only after the firefighters have escaped the building that the extent of the damage sinks in. “That’s when we realized the entire stairwell had collapsed.”
But before they’ve even had a chance to recover from the shock, the next question is already racing through their minds: where are the other colleagues, and how are they doing? “At a moment like that, you’re responsible for six families. Fortunately, we have protocols in place that mobilize a lot of backup to help us.”
‘A little angel on our shoulders’
The firefighter talks about it with a smile. But he realizes that things could have turned out very differently. “When you look back now at exactly what happened, you do think: we had a guardian angel watching over us.”
Even though Dekker was back at work after just two days off, the explosion has left its mark. Not long after the accident, a report came in about a gas leak and a strange odor—ironically, in the building directly across from the collapsed apartment building. “You go there with mixed feelings,” Dekker admits. “But this is our job. It’s never completely without danger.”
Not all of his colleagues fared as well as Dekker. One of them is still in the hospital with injuries, though the prognosis is good. The rest of his colleagues were sent home after being examined at the hospital.
He has almost recovered from the physical trauma, but Dekker doesn’t rule out the possibility that the emotional blow is yet to come. “I’m not made of stone, after all. I hope I can come to terms with it by continuing to talk about it—so that I can tuck it away in a drawer somewhere and look back on it every now and then.”
