On Tuesday, Joe Biden claimed that firefighters nearly perished while battling a 20-minute fire at his Delaware home in 2004. He also claimed that the world is increasingly depending on these people to combat the effects of climate change.
During his comments at the Summit on Fire Prevention and Control, the president drew from personal experience to discuss times in his own life when he had to depend on first responders.
Over the last 20 years, including just last week, Biden has made repeated mentions to the day his kitchen caught fire.
In his remarks on Tuesday, Biden said, “I was doing Meet the Press when lightning struck a small pond behind my house, came up through the ground, and into the air conditioning system.” Eventually produced this dense, black smoke. Everything was destroyed from the cellar to the third level and attic.
The kitchen floor was reportedly burning between beams in the house and nearly collapsed into the basement, the president said in his virtual remarks on Tuesday. “We almost lost a couple firefighters, they tell me.”
After seeing the damage caused by Hurricane Ian, Biden brought up the event at his address in Fort Myer, Florida last week.
He drew comparisons between the lightning strike that he claimed caused him to “lose an awful deal” and the category 4 hurricane that entirely destroyed villages.
With Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a Republican, looking over his shoulder, Biden said, “I know from experience how much anxiety, fear, and concern there are in the people.”
We didn’t lose our whole house, but a great deal of it was destroyed by lightning, he remarked.
When Biden was still a senator representing Delaware, lightning hit his Wilmington house, starting a tiny fire that only burned inside the kitchen. The fire in New Castle Country did not cause any injuries.
Firefighters saw thick smoke when they arrived, but they were able to confine the fire to the kitchen.
Cranston Heights Fire Company Chief George Lamborn said at the time, “Fortunately, we caught it quite early.” ‘In 20 minutes the fire was under control.
Additionally, Biden praised the emergency personnel who transported him to the hospital during a snowstorm for surgery.
In the midst of a snowstorm, my fire company rushed me to the hospital for a procedure that ended up taking nearly nine hours due to a cranial aneurism, Biden said on Tuesday. “They depressed me. They kept me alive. I thus owe you. Additionally, a great number of families and other Americans owe you money.
Firefighters, according to Biden, are essential in limiting the effects of climate change, and they deserve praise for their contributions in putting out recent large-scale forest fires.
We’re calling on you more and more and more as the effects of climate change become more and more obvious,’ Biden said.
He continued, “Extreme heat and protracted drought have transformed wildfire season into wildfire years.” “And local firefighters are getting more calls to help fight fires in the wildland urban interface where we’re moving out into the forest areas to develop and it becomes local and federal,” the author continues.