Oklahoma City Bombing Firefighter, Chris Fields

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Episode Transcript

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guests for you today. Chris Fields, who's a retired major

(02:05):
from the firefighter And you don't you don't. You may
not have heard the name, you may not think you
know who Chris Field is, but you really do. Because
if you ever watched that iconic photo at the Oklahoma
City bombing of the firefighter holding that poor little baby
in his arms. That's Chris Fields, a hero, real hero.

(02:26):
Mister Fields, are.

Speaker 1 (02:27):
You there, Yes, sir, Yes, I'm here this season. How
are you great?

Speaker 3 (02:31):
I'm doing good. I'm doing good. Thank you so much
for coming on the show. Tell the audience about Yeah,
who is Chris Fields.

Speaker 4 (02:38):
Oh, Chris Fields is a fifty three year old born
and raised.

Speaker 1 (02:43):
Oklahoma, just retired. I've been retired for.

Speaker 4 (02:47):
One year from the fire department after thirty one years
of service, married for almost thirty one years, of two
sons twenty five to nineteen and and just living living
the retired life, or trying to live the retired life.

Speaker 3 (03:06):
Yeah. And I know in your retired life is starting
this new thing called Armor Up.

Speaker 1 (03:12):
Yes, sir.

Speaker 4 (03:12):
I'm involved with two other gentlemen, Sean Riley and Jay Dobbins,
and it's we want to, uh, you know, there's such
a stigma out there with with first responders and PTSD
and uh, the all the stigma about you know, reaching
out for help, and we're trying to do a matter

(03:33):
of fact, one of our one of our little hashtags
we like to use is change the narrative because that's, uh,
we're losing first responders left and right, you know, to uh,
suicides and the ones who'll not loseing suicide, you know,
their lives, of their story, lose their families, they lose
their career, and uh, there's.

Speaker 1 (03:49):
No need for it.

Speaker 4 (03:50):
You know, thirty years ago, that was the norm, you know,
suck it up and going down the road, or that's
the way we were brought up in the in the
you know, first responder world. But uh, that's not the
way it is.

Speaker 1 (04:00):
More.

Speaker 4 (04:00):
There's help out there and they just have to know
that it's it's okay to reach out.

Speaker 3 (04:05):
Yeah, I'm about the same age as you. I'm fifty
five years old and growing up, you know, and even
even guys our age, you know, you start self medicating
and start drinking. You know, you start to yeah, you know,
taking it out in your family, you know, walking around
angry all the time. You know, what kind of solutions
have you found in your own life?

Speaker 4 (04:27):
Well, you know, I went to Uh it was funny,
I it was I double some things after the bombing.
I had some I had some guilt about the photo,
you know, and the things that exposed.

Speaker 1 (04:38):
Aaron.

Speaker 4 (04:38):
Aaron Almond is Bailey, Bailey's little girl. I was holding
her mom. Aaron of course, got exposed to you know,
a bunch of stuff and you know, and it's guilt
I was putting on myself on things I had.

Speaker 1 (04:48):
No control over.

Speaker 4 (04:49):
But you're I did find out through the past year
on how how strong your mind really is. It can
you know, control you whether that's good or bad. And
I was dealing with all this guilt about you know,
being the last one to hold her child and putting
her through all this stuff that she was going through
because people were seeing her, you know, her dead child
every time on newspaper stands and magazine racks, and so

(05:13):
I dealt with that, but it was probably you know,
ten years after that before everything really came crashing down
on me and went and got the help I needed.
And it's just the thing I've learned to accept, you know,
I've really learned to I can't control, you know, things
that are out of your control. You just you can't
let them weigh you down. And that was one of
my biggest things. And then recognizing triggers, things that may

(05:37):
may take me back or try to take me back
to those days.

Speaker 3 (05:41):
I always try and use the analogy like when you
get on an airplane, you know, you're on the airplane
with no there's nothing you can do now, you know,
you just kind of write it out to the end
of the trip. Man, it's all the worrying and fussing,
and that's change the damn thing, you know.

Speaker 1 (05:53):
So that's all right.

Speaker 4 (05:54):
I just read something today or yesterday about somebody saying
we we we worry about things that hadn't even happened yet.
How can we even worry about you know, it hadn't
happened yet, So what's theret even to worry about?

Speaker 1 (06:06):
You know.

Speaker 4 (06:06):
It's kind of the kind of the same thing on
the guilt.

Speaker 1 (06:08):
Deal stuff I was struggling with.

Speaker 4 (06:10):
It was stuff that I had no control over, so
it was just I had to learn to deal with that.

Speaker 1 (06:16):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (06:16):
The other thing they say, too, is that ninety percent
of the things we worry about never happened exactly.

Speaker 1 (06:21):
I have found that to be true.

Speaker 3 (06:23):
And once you realize that and you put that in
your head, you start looking back and you say, yeah,
you're right, you know it never exactly.

Speaker 1 (06:29):
You spend so much time preparing for the worst and
it doesn't happen. You've wasted that time.

Speaker 3 (06:34):
Right, And also too, just it's it's draining on you.
It's distracting, it puts you in a bad mood. All
this kind of stuff we were talking about before. So
tell us what happened that day, tell us what happened
when you woke up, and what happened.

Speaker 1 (06:47):
The day of the bombing.

Speaker 4 (06:48):
Yeah, it was just a normal Wednesday at the fire station.
I just remember it was a Wednesday, April nineteenth, nineteen
ninety five. You know, we are shift changes at seven am.
We do a twenty four hour shift. But uh, for
thirty one years, I never if I wasn't there at
six am, they knew I was running late. They would
call me. I was just an early riser and get there.

(07:09):
And so I'd been there since about six that morning,
drinking coffee, talking with the other shift. And they left
and we started our morning routine. You know, I think there's.

Speaker 1 (07:19):
The yard maidenance day and we were kind of getting
stuf to go grocery store, and.

Speaker 4 (07:24):
All of a sudden, we felt the We felt the
station the station ship shape, the windows rattled, and you know,
we felt it.

Speaker 1 (07:34):
We felt the percussion of.

Speaker 4 (07:35):
The boom, and and we thought a train had derailed
because there was a train yard by my station.

Speaker 1 (07:40):
I was at at that time, and we went.

Speaker 4 (07:44):
Outside and saw the clue south of US downtown and
my station at the time was only like thirteen or
fourteen blocks downtown, so we we just self dispatched. We
knew we'd be on the call, so we self dispatched
ourselves down there. So I think with all all the
all the stations there the downtown area to that.

Speaker 1 (08:00):
When they when they felt it.

Speaker 3 (08:03):
So now this was before the World Trade, the first
World trades upder bonding. This was before really anything it
was going on like that in this country. So, uh,
did you think it was terrorism? Would you?

Speaker 1 (08:16):
No?

Speaker 4 (08:16):
A matter of fact, on the while we were in route,
we were talking about Uh, one of the guys had no.

Speaker 1 (08:23):
The actual.

Speaker 4 (08:25):
Oklhoma City bombing memorial now is inside an old building
called the Water Resources Building that had some damage to
it from the bombing. Well at the time in nineteen
ninety five, they were doing a lot of remodeling on
that building, uh, steel girders and stuff. And one a
guy made a comment that he was he said, I
wonder if a welder's torch, you know, did in a
settling and that was just an explosion, you know, And

(08:47):
so we were we were just running everything, everything through
a natural gas you know, natural gas league. H I
mean we just could that the thought of terrorism, and
then on top of thattic terrorism never entered our mind.

Speaker 1 (09:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (09:03):
Just imagine how this is nineteen ninety five. I imagine
how much this world has changed, because right now it's
to be the first thing you think of, you know.

Speaker 4 (09:10):
Oh, it's it's it is crazy how much?

Speaker 3 (09:13):
Yeah, yeah, Yeah, my daughter grew up, but she was
born two thousand and one, and now she was born
in two thousand, but she was in there for two
thousand and one when the trades enter buy me. She
doesn't know a different world. She doesn't know a different
world than when what we grew up in. Yeah, I know.

Speaker 4 (09:29):
I tell my boys, you know, used to you know,
I would be during the summer, you know, I was
out of the house at seven or eight am. I
didn't come back until sundown, and we could just do
whatever we wanted to do and go where were and
you just that life just doesn't exist anymore.

Speaker 1 (09:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (09:44):
Yeah. My daughter's seventeen now and a lot of the
kids in her school don't know how to ride a bicycle.

Speaker 4 (09:51):
Well, A funny story, we were doing it. We were
doing a tour at the station. First elementary kids and
one of them are of course all the new read
you know, have power windows and all that kind of stuff.
But we were in a trade out rig that had
and the firefighters opened the door and show them the inside.

Speaker 1 (10:08):
This little girl kept saying what is that?

Speaker 4 (10:09):
He kept when he said, what, show me what you're
talking about? She did not know what the handle was
to roll the window down.

Speaker 3 (10:15):
Well, sometimes, when when I got to hire these kids,
when I got to hire these kids twenty years old
to come to my office and do some work for me,
and so we got to make some phone calls, they'll
they'll pick up the phone and say, is it supposed
to sound like this? And they never heard of down
tone on a telephone floor.

Speaker 4 (10:30):
I need some if I need some technical if I
need some technical help, I can. I'm in you know,
I'm okay. They know all that, but man, they don't
the basic just it's just it's just I wonder if
it's for my parents, it is different, you know it
is for me. For my kids, I wonder if they
see such a generational deal as I did.

Speaker 1 (10:47):
It's just crazy.

Speaker 3 (10:48):
Now, did your sons grow up to become firefighters.

Speaker 1 (10:52):
No, sir, neither one of them. Uh. The uh, my
oldest one.

Speaker 4 (10:57):
I think he might have had the drive to do it,
but I don't know if he could even pass the seat.
He's had doubible knees. He's blown out both of his
acls playing basketball.

Speaker 1 (11:06):
So he's into the Uh. He works for a local news.

Speaker 4 (11:10):
Station, and uh, he's a graduate from college getting ready
to get married. And then my youngest one. He loves the
he loves the adrenaline rush of the of the firefighting
and all that. But there's not a firefighter you can't have.
I don't tell you eighty percent of our calls or
first eight EMS calls anymore. And he just told me,
he said, I don't I don't think I can do

(11:32):
the blood and the guts and the vomit.

Speaker 1 (11:34):
And all that that. And I said, well, then that's
not then you don't want to get into it.

Speaker 4 (11:37):
I'd rather you admit it and know it now, then
to get on the job for a year or two and.

Speaker 1 (11:41):
Then quit, you know, right right. So they're just they've
just chosen different.

Speaker 4 (11:46):
Paths, which is, you know, on one hand, you know,
I do have some friends whose kids are firefighters, and
I'm glad for him, but you know, there is always
that little bit of worry.

Speaker 1 (11:54):
I mean, anything can happen to anybody on any day,
I know, but it increases your risk when you're doing
things like that for a living.

Speaker 3 (12:01):
I could imagine. So when you show up at the
Murrow building, have you ever showed up at at a
call and saw destruction like that before in your life?

Speaker 1 (12:10):
Oh?

Speaker 4 (12:11):
No, Uh, you know, we've made some cars into houses
and we you know some uh, but never not to
see uh nine stories, you know, pancake down like that,
and uh, that crater that was out in front of
the building where the truck and the bomb went off,
was just you know, it's easy for me to say,

(12:32):
it's something I'll never see in person again in my lifetime,
you know.

Speaker 3 (12:35):
So hopefully now, could you still see remnants of the truck?

Speaker 4 (12:42):
You know, It's funny we of course time, we didn't
know it was a truck, but there was a little
piece well we we parked our rig at there was
a little piece of the axle. Come to find out,
you know, just do later here hearsay that it was
a piece of the evidence they picked up.

Speaker 1 (12:58):
But it was a piece of.

Speaker 4 (12:58):
The axle from the truck, and we were a good
block away. We planted to block away, and there was
parts of the truck laying in the street down there.

Speaker 3 (13:08):
Now, after you there for a little while, all the
other responders you must have started getting win that hey,
this is a terrorist and that there could be other
bombs and things like that.

Speaker 4 (13:16):
Right, the first time we found out that it was
any kind of explosive device was they evacuated the building
at about we'd probably been there an hour maybe, and
they were it came over the radio that they had
found a second explosive device. Of course, you remember, you know,
communications weren't like they are now as far as radio traffic.

(13:39):
Everybody was stepping all over everybody. Instant command system was
real new, and so it was just kind of a
little bit of k i'll there at first. But they
said everybody needs to evacuate the building. They found another
explosive device, and we were like, what do you mean
another explosive device. So we didn't even know it until then,
And that turned out to be a dummy advice dummy

(14:00):
up on up the ninth floors where the ATF was,
and it was just some displays they had sitting out.
It was just a dummy device that somebody thought was
an actual explosive device.

Speaker 1 (14:11):
So if that's when we.

Speaker 4 (14:12):
First found out that it was had any kind of uh,
and of course immediately, you know, everybody goes into Middle
Eastern involvement, you know.

Speaker 3 (14:21):
And now think these dummy devices. They were up on
the ninth floor. How were you guys able to get
up to the ninth floor.

Speaker 4 (14:28):
Well, if you can, you have to Google up to
see pictures of the building.

Speaker 1 (14:32):
Yeah, it took out.

Speaker 4 (14:34):
It took out like the center and part of the
sides went down. But uh, there were still there were
still people up on the seventh, sixth and seventh floors.
You can see them being rescued down from aerial ladders
and that kind of stuff.

Speaker 1 (14:46):
Were part of the floor.

Speaker 4 (14:47):
It was just like it took looked like somebody like
he had a cake sitting there, and somebody took a
bike from the edge and just took a bike right
into the middle. How it kind of leaves partial sides
like a v cut way you out of a piece
of cheese.

Speaker 1 (15:01):
Sure, that's kind of what it was like. It was
like a wedge taking out of a piece of cheese.

Speaker 4 (15:04):
It left some of the side where people were still
up on the floors. There were some people that said
they were sitting at their desk and when the explosion happened,
the person that was sitting in the cross room was
gone and they were still sitting at their desk on
the sixth or seventh floor.

Speaker 3 (15:19):
Wow. So yeah, and then it must have been like
in shock, death and everything going on in there. So
in order to access them in those higher floors though,
you had to use ladders, and you couldn't use elevators
of staircase, right.

Speaker 4 (15:32):
You could use the outside. The stairwells were on one
side were operable, so you could use them, But then
they were also using aerial ladders from the outside to
get to where they could.

Speaker 3 (15:44):
Now, what about has policy changed since then? Because today
would they allow you to go into a building in
that kind of condition?

Speaker 1 (15:53):
You know, I think they would.

Speaker 4 (15:55):
On the initial I think it would have been quicker
to grab control of it.

Speaker 1 (15:59):
There was a lot out of.

Speaker 4 (16:01):
Organized chaos, I guess, for lack of a better term,
because you had you had the police doing their thing,
and the fire doing their thing, you had the amlos
doing their thing, you know, So it would have been.

Speaker 1 (16:13):
Yes, we still would have been allowed.

Speaker 4 (16:16):
I think even more so today because we are you know,
so much more. The USR stuff is trained and we
are we are Oakland Sea does have a task force now,
and so I think they would. But it would have
been a lot more organized and things just would have
been organized better. Fact, there was just we had no
you know, one lady that ended up being killed, Rebecca Anderson,

(16:36):
she was a nurse doing what she thought was right.
You know, she ran a there or try to help people.
She got hit by a piece of.

Speaker 1 (16:42):
Falling concrete and killed her.

Speaker 4 (16:44):
And so I think, you know, there was just really
no control of the building. So I think we still
would be allowed. There'll be a lot more control of
the building.

Speaker 3 (16:54):
Amazing, Yeah, like in New York, you know, because I'm
from New York City and my partner was NYPD Harbor Aviation.
In fact, he rescued those people off of the twin
towers the first bombing in ninety three. They've been in
the helicopters and but but you know nowadays, when there's
something big things half fifteen minutes later they stander on
trick and coffee. You know, they got that scene under control.

(17:15):
You know, it's like a whole nother world.

Speaker 1 (17:18):
It is.

Speaker 3 (17:18):
Yeah, so no, I guess what happened was there was
a daycare center in the building.

Speaker 4 (17:27):
There was a there was a called America's Kids. There
was a daycare inside the Federal building. Of course, now
there's a confuw. You know, it was the Apha pe
Murror Building. I'd been on the job ten years at
the time in the downtown area. I'd never heard it
referred to as the Federal building. We had a federal
we had a federal courthouse behind it. So when it

(17:49):
first came in, they said the federal building. A lot
of us were thinking in the federal I guess this
was called the federal building because it how so many
federal offices like HUD and you know atf and Security
Administration and stuff like that. Anyway, so they oh, there
was a daycare on the second floor, and that's where

(18:11):
nineteen of the I think sixteen of the nineteen children
that were killed, I may be wrong. Sixteen or seven
were in the daycare and the other one just happened
to be in the building with their parents.

Speaker 3 (18:22):
That's horrific. Did you actually have to witness that?

Speaker 1 (18:28):
You know, the book. We saw some you know, we couldn't.

Speaker 4 (18:31):
There was a lot of people that couldn't be extricated
at the time, and a few were kids. The only one,
like I say that I was really actually handled was
Bailey in that photo.

Speaker 3 (18:43):
Bailly Almond. And well, you know what, we're coming up
to a little commercial break. When do we get into
that whole part of the discussion when we returned. So
we're with Chris Fields. He retired a major from the
Oklahoma City Fire Department and he's working on this thing
called Armour Up to help help other people are victims
of victims, but people are experiencing ps PTSD and trying

(19:07):
to help people cope with that. And Douce and now
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(23:34):
I'm your host, private investigator. At Opperman. We're here today
with Chris Field's former Major Chris Fields of the Oklahoma
City Fire Department was there in the Burro Building and
he's the one in that iconic photo holding that little
baby Bailey. Almond, how did you come in contact with
little Bailey?

Speaker 4 (23:53):
We had been we had got an assignment to go
to the south side of the building and start you know,
searching around in there. And as we were walking to
the south side of the building, a gentleman that's time,
I didn't know he was a police officer. He was
just in street clothes, but a gentleman said, I have
a critical infant. And of course, you know at that time,

(24:17):
it's a little more prevalent now plice in the first day,
but at that time, you know, police weren't didn't have
much first aid training, if any, just wasn't done back
the not in Oklahoma City anyway, you know, we were
all first responders and that kind of stuff for EMTs.

Speaker 1 (24:31):
And so I just.

Speaker 4 (24:32):
Said, and you know, and I don't know why. I mean,
you know, my mom says God's hand was in it.
But I just said, here, I'll take her. And he
gave me Bailey, and I don't even know if he
had checked for any signs of life.

Speaker 1 (24:48):
I think he was just.

Speaker 4 (24:49):
Either he either scooped her up out of the building
or somebody handed but you know, I think they were
handing them out, so they he just he he handed
her to me, and I immediately checked her for, you know,
any any signs of life and had to clear some
insulation like stuff out of her throat and she had

(25:10):
a little slight, slight, little open skull fracture, and of
course I didn't I didn't find any signs of life.

Speaker 1 (25:18):
So I took her right across the street.

Speaker 4 (25:20):
The ambulance was over there and some paramedics and the
same thing. I just told him I had a critical infant.
And the paramedic was down on the ground working on
a lady, and his ambulance was full, had two people
in the ambulance. He had stretchers on the ground that
were full, and I remember him looking at me saying,
hold on, just second, I will get a blanket that

(25:41):
baby on the ground. And that's when I'm now that
I know, looking back at the photo and the photo
was taken. That's I'm sitting there just you know, looking
at her, waiting for him to get a blanket on
the ground, and that's when I was just thinking, I
just ca I can't imagine how somebody's work rold is
getting ready to be turned up upside now, yeah, and uh,

(26:05):
of course that moment, you know, I'm focused on Bailey.
Even at the nine thing was on number nine thirty
in the morning, so it's.

Speaker 1 (26:16):
Still a long day ahead, a lot of that.

Speaker 4 (26:19):
But uh, that's how that's how I came to be
photographed holding Neely.

Speaker 3 (26:24):
And then how did it come? How did you find
out that your pity was going to be used in
a national magazine?

Speaker 4 (26:31):
I was at the Uh we got back to the
station that night about eleven, I think when we finally
got released, went back to duty, and uh uh our
chief dispatcher guy, I'm good friends with, Harvey Weathers. He
called and another guy answered the phone, and he said, well,
hold on, Harvey, let me get one of the captains
because captains wore red helmets captains.

Speaker 1 (26:53):
I was a captain then before it came major. But anyway, he.

Speaker 4 (26:57):
Got on the phone and Harvey said, hey, Chris, did
you carry a baby out of the building.

Speaker 1 (27:01):
I said, I said no, Harvey, I didn't.

Speaker 4 (27:03):
I said a gentleman at the time, still not knowing
Sergeant Avery was a police officer. I said, no, a
gentleman handed me a baby and he said, oh okay. He said,
I think there's a photo. I think this photos you.
And I said, well, I don't know. Let me I
see the other two captains. I was at a large station.
We had three captains there, so I asked the other
two and they said no, we didn't you know, hold

(27:24):
a baby or I said, Harvey, I guess it's me.

Speaker 1 (27:27):
And he said, well, Chris, I know it. You just
want to confirm it.

Speaker 4 (27:29):
He said, the AP has faxed this photo to us
and they want us to identify the firefighter in the photo.
And he said, I know it's you. He said, I'm
getting ready to call the FU chief or the PIO
and just tell them what the APT and at you,
and go ahead and identify you. And I said, okay,
you know and he said and this guy said, this.

Speaker 1 (27:48):
Picture's going worldwide and I thought, oh wow, okay.

Speaker 4 (27:52):
So when I hung up, all the guys were kind
of just listening in and they said, what's that about.
I said, I don't know, boys, I said, but apparently
I'm going worldwide tomorrow, you know, really not having a
clue because at that time, I still hadn't seen the photo.
I didn't know when it was taken, you know, I
didn't you know, so I really when I said that,
I was just kind of, you know, being a smart

(28:13):
art saying, I guess I'm going worldwide, you know how.

Speaker 3 (28:16):
Plus you must have been so exhausted. You must have
been so exhausted enough, Yeah, you must have been so exhausted,
like you know, who cares, you know?

Speaker 1 (28:23):
Yeah, yeah, So we went to bed.

Speaker 4 (28:26):
Uh we made a house fire during the middle of
the night, and then we got up about six o'clock.
And when I got up, some guys one guy had
the Day of Oklahoma and had a little uh it
was on an inset, little inset picture on the Day
of Oklahoma paper. And then another guy came in and
tossed down the USA Today, and uh, one guy. Of course,

(28:47):
you know, you didn't have social media like we're have now,
you know, as far as you know, Twitter and all
that kind of stuff. So, uh, we just started watching
the news and they were just showing this iconic, you
know photo and they were just showing you know, Hong
Kong Singapore, I mean.

Speaker 1 (29:03):
Just all over where this picture was being circulated.

Speaker 3 (29:08):
And so how did this change your life?

Speaker 9 (29:11):
Oh wow, it's uh, like I said, one of the
one of the main things I dealt with was, you know,
all the all the you know, cops and firefighters were
all the same.

Speaker 1 (29:22):
It's it's a you know, cops do a little.

Speaker 4 (29:24):
More individual words because of the nature of their job, but
you know, firefighting such a team effort and everybody's involved.
And so I really struggled with the guilt of being
being singled out when you know, I'm sure I'm not
the only one that was you know, carrying a baby
that day, or you know, checking for signs of life
and somebody already being deceased.

Speaker 1 (29:43):
But so I struggled with that. But and I'll stop
there and say, but.

Speaker 4 (29:46):
One of the things that helped me with that was
I had I had outstanding, outstanding moral support from all
the guys and girls on the fire department. I mean,
it was it was overwhelming. When I was doing some
of these inner used him telling me, hey, man, you
know you're doing a good job.

Speaker 1 (30:02):
We're glad that you representing the fire department. So that
kind of that helped.

Speaker 4 (30:08):
But then I was dealing with the guilt of being
in this photo. Again, Like I said, you know, the
mind is so powerful that I knew I didn't. I mean,
it wasn't like I stopped and posed for if I
didn't have any control over it. But yet I felt
the guilt for all the stuff that was putting on Aaron,
which is Bailey's mom. And and then you know, finding out
that that the guilt of finding out, you know, that

(30:29):
I was the last one to hold her child, which
that was just a I felt like, I, you know,
I robbed her of that and then put the pressure,
you know, so, so on one on the one hand,
I'm struggling with that, and on the other hand, I
have you know, people saying, hey, so and so. Once
you know, I got hooked up with John Hanson, he
was our public information officer. You know, you don't feel

(30:51):
like you can say no to interviews because then you're
the fireman that won't tell.

Speaker 1 (30:55):
You know. It's just kind of one of those.

Speaker 4 (30:59):
Danged if you do, danged if you don't situations, you know,
And so the pressure of all that I let kind
of build up on me, and.

Speaker 1 (31:09):
So it did.

Speaker 10 (31:09):
It took a toll it, but being on the fire
department that time, being a first responder and being around
the people, I.

Speaker 1 (31:20):
Never showed it.

Speaker 4 (31:21):
I was still happy to go look at the fire state,
full of energy, playing a game.

Speaker 1 (31:24):
You know.

Speaker 4 (31:25):
Inside I was just, man, I was just I didn't
know what to do. I didn't know there was anybody
to talk to. I mean, they tried to give us
people to talk to, but it was so you know,
PTSD back then was you know, I don't know if
it was PTSD back then, it was just dealing with
a traumatic event.

Speaker 3 (31:42):
And shell shock. They would call it things like that,
end right, you know, And.

Speaker 4 (31:45):
For the limited amount of things we'd heard about PTSD
back then, it was all you know, Vietnam VET, that's
the military, you know.

Speaker 1 (31:54):
You know, it's just something we didn't talk about in
the Fire service. And so.

Speaker 4 (31:59):
It was it was just stuff I suppressed and went
on about my about my job, fearing that if you know,
if I did let them know it was affecting me,
that they may say, well, hey, we can't have you
on the job if you're not if you can't handle it,
you know.

Speaker 1 (32:12):
That was that was a fear you live with, and.

Speaker 3 (32:15):
Uh, you know, well, when when Really it's the other
way around, because if you're if you're exposed to something
that traumatic, you know, and it doesn't affect you, then
you're the person to be. You got to watch out
for that guy. That's the guy who you know, that's
the serial killer man. That's the guy you got to
watch out for.

Speaker 4 (32:33):
That is And now that now that you know, I've
spoken to a few of our rookie classes and stuff.

Speaker 1 (32:40):
They've asked me to come speak some of the off
and that's kind of thing I've told them.

Speaker 4 (32:43):
I said, Hey, if you're the guy that can can
do this job and it not affects you, and then
if you're that strong, be there for the person that
does need to talk to somebody.

Speaker 1 (32:53):
You know. Evidently that's your role, you know, if you
you know, I've had people say, well, you can't take
this job personal. Really, how do you do what we
do and not take things personal? You know?

Speaker 4 (33:03):
How are you toasted to be trying to save this
person's life and you don't and you not take it personal?
I just don't. I just don't know how you do that.
I'm not very good at that.

Speaker 3 (33:12):
Yeah, Now, Aaron Ahmand, did you get it? Obviously you
met her. You got to meet her a rant and
get to know her.

Speaker 1 (33:20):
Yeah, we are.

Speaker 4 (33:21):
We are kind of like a you know, she's married
and has two kids since then, and of course we've
I've only had one son at the time. We've got
another one now, and so we've just all kind.

Speaker 1 (33:31):
Of kind of grown up together.

Speaker 4 (33:33):
She was eleven year she was only a twenty one
or twenty two year old single mom.

Speaker 1 (33:36):
At the time that that happened.

Speaker 4 (33:38):
And the day before April eighteenth was Bailey's first birthday,
so it was it was you know, it hit her.

Speaker 1 (33:45):
Pretty hard at all at once. But we a reporter
set up.

Speaker 4 (33:49):
A meeting between us because she wanted to meet me
and Sergeant Avery, and she just wanted to tell us
thank you, which you talking about taking you to your knees.

Speaker 1 (33:57):
Here.

Speaker 4 (33:57):
You're the big, tough firefighter and police officer and you
got a twenty one year old single mom thanking you,
and you think, what is she thanking us for?

Speaker 1 (34:05):
You know?

Speaker 4 (34:06):
And I always felt guilty because a lot of people
didn't know Bailey was deceased, and they would say, this
is the firefightre what a heroic effort he rescued, you know,
And I had to say, you know, no, I didn't
rescue her. You know she was so I dealt with
that stigma of being called this hero and that when
she wasn't alive, I didn't save her. But when you
talk to Aaron, Aaron says, yes, you did rescue her.

(34:28):
She say, you rescued her from that building. You didn't
save her life. She couldn't save her life. She was
dead in the building, but you rescued her from that building.
I knew her fate early, you know. And Aaron's main concern,
she was worried about all these people that had to wait,
you know, three and four days.

Speaker 1 (34:42):
You know, to find out.

Speaker 4 (34:44):
So that's the one thing she wanted to do was
thank me and a Sergeant Avery for and she thanked
me for the way I was holding Bailey. She said
she could tell that I was a father that had kids.

Speaker 1 (34:53):
And you know that she was in uh, she was
taken care of.

Speaker 4 (34:57):
So that's how we met and we just kind of
been I've been kind of like a big.

Speaker 1 (35:02):
Brother ever since.

Speaker 4 (35:04):
You know, We've been to each other's kids birthday parties
and graduations and so we're still friends today.

Speaker 3 (35:11):
What a story, man, Now?

Speaker 1 (35:13):
Now?

Speaker 3 (35:13):
What about what was she doing in the building that day.
What business was it did she have there?

Speaker 1 (35:18):
She lived, There's Regency Towers.

Speaker 4 (35:21):
There were some condo like apartment condos across the street downtown,
and a lot of people that lived there or that
work downtown had their kids and daycares there because everybody
where they worked. So there was actually another daycare right
across the street in a YMCA building.

Speaker 1 (35:38):
There was a daycare there.

Speaker 4 (35:39):
So she had dropped she had dropped Bailey there off
there for the daycare. So and she just worked three
or four blocks away at an insurance company.

Speaker 3 (35:50):
Okay. So yeah, I always had the impression that it
was just people who worked in the building that they
kept their kids there.

Speaker 1 (35:56):
No, it was just it was an open daycare.

Speaker 3 (35:58):
Okay, So that's interesting. Yeah, boy, So then what happened
with the rest of your career? Did the did this
affect you with that?

Speaker 1 (36:08):
Well?

Speaker 4 (36:08):
You know, like I said, I rocked along for m
It's funny we should be talking about this today because
I was just looking at some stuff today. I was
rocking along till about two thousand and five. Uh, you know,
playing the game, being the being the good guy that
can handle everything, and we were going to put a
pool in here at the house that I would do

(36:29):
a little add on and put a pool in.

Speaker 1 (36:30):
And I had to bust out some concrete.

Speaker 4 (36:33):
And this is when I, after going to a couple
of years of therapy, now I know what a trigger is.

Speaker 1 (36:40):
Uh. We were out there.

Speaker 4 (36:41):
And it started to rain while I was busting his
concrete out. Well, a lot of people don't know that
early evening of the bombing get started raining. There was
that wet concrete, concrete dust smell, and it always stuck
with me and I hadn't noticed it at times over
the years. I thought, guy, smells like the bombing or smells,
you know, smells. And I was out there with a

(37:02):
jackhammer busting out this concrete and started raining, and I
caught that smell and it, I mean, it was like
I dropped my d's and I thought, God must just
like that day.

Speaker 1 (37:15):
And I thought about that the rest of the day.

Speaker 4 (37:18):
And you know, looking, I can notice that's kind of
what things started, you know what, like a sudden It
was gradually I was becoming a little more distant from
my family, a little more isolated, a little more.

Speaker 1 (37:30):
Uh.

Speaker 4 (37:32):
You know, I said, I'm not a heavy drinker. I'm
a social drinker to even today. But you know, I
got to noticing that. Well, instead of I'll tell you what,
I'm wanna fall asleep quick, so let's just have a
two extra jack and coach, now, you know, or you know,
let's you know that. I started kind of getting into
that and then started disconnecting from my family, you know, uh, coach,

(37:54):
both my boys and the little league started started not
being interested in that, and just you know, just I
could feel myself just detaching myself from my family and
isolating which and lived like that. Once that came back,
I lived like that for another five years. It was

(38:14):
twenty ten before I went first and got any before
I sought out any council on anything to do with
PTSD or you know, dramatic memories or anything like that.
So it was twenty ten when I went from my
started going to counseling and everything, and was diagnosed with PTSD.
And by this time, you know, I was me and

(38:35):
my wife are separated, and I was living in an
old apartment by myself, but on the outside, I was
still the happy, go lucky guy.

Speaker 1 (38:44):
This is what I wanted, this is the course I.

Speaker 4 (38:46):
Have picked, you know, So everything was great on the
outside and on the inside, and I was just I was,
I was crumbling. And like I said, after going to counseling,
you know, I've I've I found that it wasn't just
you know that wet concrete doest smell triggered it from

(39:06):
the bombing, And it wasn't just the photo. It was
it was years of stuff of just you know, you're
always like we were talking in the way we were
brought up in our generation, you're still you know, suck.

Speaker 1 (39:16):
It up, be tough, you know. Well those when that
suck it up. Every time I had to suck it up.

Speaker 4 (39:21):
The it's were a series of dramatic events that I
had never really emotionally you know, processed.

Speaker 1 (39:30):
And uh, I don't know. If we're up on a
commercial break, I was gonna go into you know, we'll
have time.

Speaker 3 (39:36):
I'm gonna make you my producer perfect. You're doing great man,
Thank you. So it's great stuff, not great stuff, but
it really is. Yeah, it's really interesting, and it's it's hard,
and it's educational to pretty any then it's really good
to hear this. And the thing is, you know, even
if you're not out there drunk driving and crashing your
car and you know, attempting suicide. Just the loss of

(39:58):
those years of happy, production of normal years is it's
this is something that we need to work and work for.
You know, the light is short. You know, fifty five
years old yourself, life for short? Yeah, can list of
time man, especially think I got kids. We'll be right
back with more of Chris Fields Major Chris Fields of
from the Fire Department, Oklahoma City. And now a.

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(44:44):
I'm your host private investigator at Opperman. We're here today
with Chris Fields, Oklahoma City Fire Department and retired the
guy in that iconic photo holding that little baby, Bailey Almond. Chris,
let me let me ask you a question. Now, you
were there at the scene, and you lived there after,
you live through the trial and through the investigation and

(45:05):
all this kind of stuff. What do you make when
you hear these theories that John Dole number two and
McVeigh had help, and the Nichols talking about all these
things as well, you know, the government was involved, and
so what do you make of all that? You and
your friends on the department.

Speaker 11 (45:22):
You know, I I won't speak for all of them,
but I know in my circles that we think they
got exactly who was involved, you know, they I think
it was.

Speaker 4 (45:36):
Timmoth McVay and Terry Nichols. I think that's the I
think they were. You know, I think they everybody tried
to escape, goat it, you know, some other way, or
you know, I listened to some people with their theories,
but they're the same ones that have a you know,
anti government theory on everything. You know, So personally, I.

Speaker 1 (45:59):
Think they got who they were supposed to get and
I think one of them got what he was supposed
to get.

Speaker 4 (46:07):
And uh and you know, I guess they made the
other one a deal, so he would, you know, uh
tell all on On McVeigh. So, unlike most people, I
tried not to give him too much thought. But you know,
it does pop up when when the anniversaries come around,
because of course, you know, his name gets mentioned and
they'll they showed little, you know, snippets on the news

(46:28):
and stuff.

Speaker 1 (46:28):
So I just tried to.

Speaker 4 (46:32):
I've just never been a big conspiracy theorist guy. You know,
maybe if I sat down and read and looked, I
might Maybe that's why I don't.

Speaker 3 (46:39):
Right, well, yeah, you know what that stuff because that
could be another whole depressing situation as well.

Speaker 1 (46:47):
Exactly.

Speaker 3 (46:49):
So, so how'd you come out after the therapy?

Speaker 4 (46:54):
You know, it was Uh, the thing that helped me
most ed was was And it's the point that me
and Jay and Sean, the other two guys I'm working
with are trying to get across to people, is when
I finally went to a place out in California where
it was It's a West Coast post traumatic place and
it's it's nothing but first responders that have been through it,

(47:19):
and of course there's also clinicians there also, but you
have it's.

Speaker 1 (47:22):
A small group.

Speaker 4 (47:23):
There's probably like I was there for a week, and
I think there's six or seven maybe you know what
they call clients, I guess, and then each one of
you as a peer counselor, which is, you know, another
first responder that's been where you've been, And that's always
nice when somebody can say I know what you're talking about,
and you know, they really do you know, and which

(47:44):
in turn hearing them say I know what you I
know what you're saying. Been there, done that, felt that,
and yes, this person here, this clinician has done nothing
but work with first responders all their life.

Speaker 1 (47:57):
They can help.

Speaker 4 (47:58):
So, you know, was I really just going to go
straight to a clinician.

Speaker 1 (48:02):
No, I did try that, you know.

Speaker 4 (48:03):
They sent me to our fire department, chaplain had a
I went to a like a family counselor first who
knew nothing about you know, PTSD or knew nothing about
first responders. Their their deal was, you know, it's the bombing.
There's gonna be a lot of y'all struggle with this.
It's strictly the bombing, you know, And I probably if
I just would have dealt with that, I probably would

(48:25):
have been good for a while. But I think I
still would have ended up where I did because of
all the other all the other stuff that I had
suppressed over the years, you know, and not all of
it's fire departmentally. Some of it's personal life issues, and
some of it's uh, you know, three years on the job.

Speaker 1 (48:38):
We make a house fire and I'm uh, you know.

Speaker 4 (48:42):
We go over on the second alarm, and there's one
of my mentors and the reason I got on the
fire department.

Speaker 1 (48:47):
He's dead.

Speaker 4 (48:47):
Guy who went to Riggi school with He's dead killed,
you know, three guys in a house fire, and I
got three years on the job. We didn't talk to anybody,
you know. We cried and hugged our brothers at the
funeral and we were there for everybody, but we didn't
sit around and talk about it. You didn't do that,
you know. He had to suck it up, and I was.
I was assigned our p IO for a while, was

(49:08):
on the job, and I have to make one of
my best one of my good friends, him and his
twelve year old son were killed in a head on
car wreck by drunk drivers.

Speaker 1 (49:16):
Well, once they found out it was off duty firefighter,
it was killed. Yeah, of course the media.

Speaker 4 (49:21):
So I'm now I'm doing p IO interviews about one
of my you know, good friends and his twelve year
old son that were killed.

Speaker 1 (49:29):
We didn't have anybody to talk to about it. We
just we sucked it up. You know.

Speaker 4 (49:32):
It's just it's just that theme that that's just what
you do.

Speaker 1 (49:35):
And so there was just a.

Speaker 4 (49:38):
Series of events on the fire department that and like
say in personal life, that just and you got to
talk about it, and they say, the thing that helped
me most was seeing other first responders that had been
through it and come out on the other side.

Speaker 3 (49:52):
Now, what about after the Oklahoma City bombing, after Immerse
Building bombing, and we know how it affected you, but
what about your buddy he's in the department. Because back
in New York after the World Trade Center bombing, every
cop I knew and every firefighter I knew it was
just showing up to work drunk. They were just shown
there were drunk every day showing up And this is
like common you know amongst everyone when they were worked,

(50:14):
when they were working there, you know them when they
show up to work the rest of that month before
they brought in the iron workers, that everyone was just
self medicating. Was that kind of stuff going on there?

Speaker 4 (50:22):
Yeah, I don't think it was as prevalent as maybe there.
I mean, I don't know, but I know we had ours.
You know, we did have one Oklahoma City cop commit suicide. Yeah,
shortly after the bombing.

Speaker 1 (50:34):
And uh, I think I was talking to our fire
department chacking one day and I told me I can't
remember the number of divorces over the next ten years
amongst firefighters.

Speaker 4 (50:46):
I mean, it's a high rate anyway between for you know,
amongst versusponders and divorces. But it was just it was
astronomical the amount of divorces and the sad thing. I mean,
I still got buddies today that all I talked to
every now and then been retired. I've been retired five
six years, and they'll tell me they still have nightmares.

Speaker 1 (51:07):
You know.

Speaker 4 (51:07):
I had a guy the other day tell me it was, well,
this is the anniversary was just last month. He texted
me something and said, hey, bad, just.

Speaker 1 (51:15):
Checking on you. Yeah, you know ya YadA.

Speaker 4 (51:17):
And at the end of his deal, he says, I
wish I could get that day out of my mind.
You know, here we are twenty three years later, and
he still texts me messages about he wished he could
get that stuff out of his mind. But he's he's
at a point where I was where he's not.

Speaker 1 (51:31):
He don't want to deal with it. He can handle it,
he just can't get it out of his mind. And
that's just the way he'll live with it.

Speaker 3 (51:35):
You know, it's a trum it's a trauma, like a
gunshot wound trauma. You just can't just say, well, I'm
going to ignore this. It's going to go away, you know.

Speaker 4 (51:44):
Well, And that's that's what I try to tell me.
It's to me, it's an injury. It's a it's a
brain injury.

Speaker 1 (51:49):
It's it's like a knee injury or an ankle or
you have surgery, you.

Speaker 4 (51:53):
Rehabit, and you can go back to work. And it's
the same thing with this man. You can look at me.

Speaker 1 (51:57):
I went back. I went back and did another.

Speaker 4 (52:01):
Six to seven years after I left and went to
got PTS counseling, and and I came back and had
five or six more for the best years of my
fire department life.

Speaker 3 (52:12):
And did you also use medication or it would just
talk therapy.

Speaker 1 (52:17):
Just talk therapy.

Speaker 4 (52:18):
I've never been I've never been a medication guy. I
think because I feel like I have an addicted personality,
you know, like if something works, I almost stick with it.
Like if you know, I'm wearing a blue shirt and
I'm in Vegas and I'm good and good at the
black I'm wearing a blue shirt every.

Speaker 1 (52:38):
Time, you know, It's just that's just me.

Speaker 4 (52:40):
So I think if I'm if I happened to take
something to feel better, I just it just scares me
the thought of feeling like I had to take stuff.

Speaker 1 (52:48):
So I was fortunate.

Speaker 4 (52:49):
I know some people need it and it does help,
so I'm glad it's there, But for me, it was
just never.

Speaker 1 (52:54):
It was just never an option.

Speaker 3 (52:55):
Yeah. I think sometimes too, it can have the reverse
effects too, you know, they can then dig it and
of course a lot of the side effects on these
depression drugs is suicide and stuff, you know. Yeah, and
so if you got to think if you can avoid
that stuff and really try to avoid it. Yeah, so
we're almost out of time that what do you want
to leave us with?

Speaker 1 (53:18):
You know?

Speaker 4 (53:19):
I just I just want to leave everybody with And
it's not just it's not first responders only. That's another
thing I usually try to say. And you know, because
a lot of times we're speaking to first responders, but
there may be somebody there that's, you know, helping set
the event up.

Speaker 1 (53:32):
They're not a first responder.

Speaker 4 (53:34):
But post traumatic stress is not just for first responders,
you know, it's it's any traumatic event in anybody's life.
And what I've learned, and trust me, I was the
guy that carried the fake smile for twenty something years
and thought I could handle it, I'm telling you, and you.

Speaker 1 (53:52):
Will be shocked.

Speaker 4 (53:53):
I've always said that I was shocked when I finally
reached out how many people were reaching back to help me.
So that's just kind of my mess y'all will get
out there that it's to erase the stigma, change the
narrative of it. If you need help, reach out. And
it doesn't mean therapy. It doesn't mean going away. I
mean for some people it might, but it may just
be talking to somebody. Find somebody you can talk to,
a friend you can confide in that helps you, you know.

(54:16):
So that's my message is don't just just don't let
that event or a series of events. Just control your life.
It'll it'll, it'll bring you down.

Speaker 3 (54:27):
Yeah, you can waste so many years of your life.
And Chris, I really want to thank you because I know,
I know, I've interviewed a lot of people that been
through trauma, and I know when you have this conversation
on the air, you know you're kind of like you're
sort of like more attentive. But when after the show,
you know what I mean, like right, it's a train
on you. So I really appreciate you coming on the show,

(54:48):
and I do believe that you're going to help many
many people listening to you here. So thank you so much.

Speaker 1 (54:53):
Well, thank you for the opportunity. I truly appreciate it.

Speaker 3 (54:56):
Chris, you got anything if you want to promote, gim
me quote put you right on there.

Speaker 1 (54:58):
Okay, okay, so that great. Thank you very much, Thank.

Speaker 3 (55:01):
You, sir. Good. Oh boy. They got Chris fields man
a former firefighter there at the Murrah Building, Oklahoma City bombing.
Really nothing to promote, just once to come tell the story.
He's got this thing coming on armor up he's doing
with this uh Jay Daubin, who is this Coppo was
in the Hell's Angels on Undercover Hell's Angels. I tried

(55:21):
to book him and he says, hey, my buddy Chris,
come on. So Chris was nice enough to come on
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You can have your ad played here at Oppermanreport dot
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(58:22):
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Speaker 3 (59:32):
Timefirmed to The Washington Post that kid one hundred and
fifty thousand dollars. Welcome back to the Opperman Report. Thank
you so much for listening. Thank you Chris Field's first
responder The're in Oklahoma City bombing nineteen ninety five. If
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