EXTRAORDINARY PEOPLE: The Firehouse Heroes

WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — We find a lot of humble folks in our Extraordinary Person of the Week series. Folks llike Carmen Delia. He’s a Firehouse Hero.

“You know, this is just a job that I love, it’s not even a job,” Carmen Delia said, “it’s a calling and I haven’t worked a day in my life since I worked here.”

His fellow firefighters think the world of him.

“He makes the fire station a great place. Always makes sure everyone is in a good mood,” a colleague said via nomination video.
“He’s a great leader, leads by example,” another firehouse hero chimed in via the same nomination video.

Carmen Delia loading up his Rescue 2 truck

“This is me, I’m the driver of the rescue. That’s my job,” Delia said in front of the Rescue 2 truck.

Carmen ‘Sal’ Delia is a 17 year veteran of the Wilmington Fire Department. He joined after serving in the US Marine Corps.

Delia is the 2015 Firefighter of the Year and so focused on the team being a family, almost all his answers involved the crew he is a part of and loves so much.

“It’s a humbling experience,” Delia said of the honors, “because there are so many deserving individuals in this department, everyone works really hard.”

Really Hard. Each and every one of the firehouse heroes do it for you, me…..’We”. And in Delia’s case, meant to be at Station 2 at Empie Park.

“It’s something I’ve always dreamed of doing, this fire house(#2), well, this is about 4 years old, but there was a station on the same property, growing up as a kid not far from here I used to come to the fire house,” Delia reminisced, “and the firemen were great to me and it’s something I’ve always had a passion for and always wanted to do.”

Now, courtesy of a video put together by his brothers and sisters at the station, he’s one of 20 firefighters who get a free trip to the worlds largest firefighter training conference happening in April in Indiana.

A perfect trip for this kinda guy. “I put a lot of emphasis on training, so what I can learn out there and bring back to my brothers and sisters here in this department, hopefully they can benefit as well.”

So it’s a win win. Carmen Delia, aka ‘Sal’, may be the only one headed to the training expo, but what he shares when he returns could help save all our lives….and that is Extraordinary!

We love all our Firehouse Heroes! Thank you for all you do for us, everyday.  Thank you so very much.
-Daniel