Damien Burke was short in stature but cast a long shadow.
He was many things: father of nine, perfectionist electrician, keen fisherman, mentor to young blokes and friend to many, as evidenced by the many hundreds of people who turned out to farewell him in Moonee Ponds yesterday.
Unfailingly modest, he would have been overawed by the guard of honour that spanned 500 metres, stopping traffic on Mount Alexander Road.
DAMIEN BURKE. PICTURE: VIA FACEBOOK
For above all Mr Burke was a great leader; one of Victoria’s finest fire fighters.
Mr Burke, 53, was a senior station officer with the Metropolitan Fire Brigade, based in Footscray, and after 27 years’ service became known as the best the MFB had.
He died suddenly last week while on secondment with the Country Fire Authority in Mildura.
News of his death ricocheted around the state and has left many of his workmates devastated: men and women whose daily lives are touched by trauma.
A Facebook tribute has gone viral, being viewed by 100,000 people and shared hundreds of times, with colleagues and friends expressing disbelief and heartbreak that “Burkey”, whose other nickname at the MFB was Great Man, is gone.
FIREFIGHTERS SALUTE A TRUCK FROM DAMIEN BURKE’S HOME STATION FOOTSCRAY. PHOTO BY JASON SOUTH
And what’s being described as an unprecedented action, the number 47 has been put on almost all CFA and MFB fire trucks in Victoria in honour of Mr Burke, who was based at station 47 in Footscray.
Throughout his career as a firefighter and first-responder Mr Burke saw the worst things anyone can see: fires, murders, car accidents, child deaths.
Even to his closest mates he seemed to take the work in his stride; the words patient, respect, compassion and integrity were on high rotation in the eulogies.
FIRE TRUCKS ACROSS VICTORIA HAVE FOOTSCRAY FIRE STATION’S NUMBER 47 ON THEM IN TRIBUTE TO DAMIEN BURKE. PICTURE: FACEBOOK
In just seven months in Mildura, he was credited with doing more to galvanise the relationship between the CFA and the MFB than anyone who has gone before him.
One of his collegaues described him as “the definition of what you want good leadership to be.”
But great leader or no, Mr Burke’s death will have the greatest effect upon those who carried his coffin and made their way slowly behind the hearse: his six sons, three daughters and heartbroken wife, Anne.
Julia May, The Age
