By Michael Risinit
Journal News
Copyright 2007 Journal News
 Photo courtesy of Empire State Ambulance Corp. Matthew Lamb |
CARMEL, N.Y. — “Amazing Grace” was the final song played yesterday for 25-year-old Matthew Lamb of Lake Carmel, an emergency medical technician and Carmel volunteer firefighter who died last week after the ambulance in which he was riding crashed.
The hymn floated from bagpipes as family and friends paid one last respect to Lamb at the Raymond Hill Cemetery. Sondra, his mother, accepted the American flag draping his coffin.
For a young man who knew when duty called, the musical selection most likely would have made sense. But it was a far cry from the karaoke-fueled Bon Jovi he liked to perform, best friend Robert Lipton Jr. said earlier.
“Matt, we love you. We miss you,” Lipton said inside the St. James the Apostle Church on Gleneida Avenue.
It was there that Lipton and Carmel Fire Chief Daryl Johnson swung from tears to laughter and back while speaking about Lamb, taking with them those filling all the pews and lining the walls.
Johnson recalled Lamb’s eagerness to serve, as a teenager joining the Explorer posts sponsored by the Lake Carmel and Kent fire departments as well as the Putnam County Sheriff’s cadet program. After coming on board at the Carmel department, Lamb joined the Carmel Ambulance Corps. He then became a paid EMT with Empire State Ambulance.
“Matt loved and was dedicated to every aspect of the emergency services, so it is no wonder he lost his life to this love and dedication,” said Johnson, once wiping away tears with his white-gloved left hand.
Lamb died Thursday, about a day after the Empire ambulance his 27-year-old EMT partner was driving went off Route 9 in Garrison and struck a tree. State police said the driver, Jonathan Romero of the Bronx, apparently fell asleep. The two were returning from an early morning call and Lamb was in the back.
Although Lamb was clinically brain dead following the accident, his family kept him alive so his organs could be donated. Ten recipients, Johnson said during the service, benefited, including a 2-year-old girl needing a liver.
“Anyone that knows Matt knows that he would do whatever he could to help children and this is a true testament to how he lived his life,” the fire chief said.
The Rev. Vincent Howley, the department’s chaplain and a priest at St. James, referred to Lamb’s many roles in illustrating those affected by his passing: Fire Prevention Week instructor at the parish school, counselor at Camp Wilbur Herrlich in Patterson and substitute religious education teacher.
“I suspect Matthew had no idea of the number of people he touched,” Howley said.
For the service, police blocked off Gleneida Avenue to traffic, leaving it clear for the fire engine carrying Lamb’s coffin and the hundreds of firefighters and EMTs from throughout the region who came to say goodbye. Various shades of uniform blue contrasted with the gray of nearby Lake Gleneida and the gloomy sky. Black, shiny dress shoes — their owners from Putnam Valley, Lake Carmel, Patterson, Mahopac, Mamaroneck village, Bethel, Conn., and elsewhere — toed the road’s double-yellow line.
After the service, several of Lamb’s Fire Department colleagues hoisted his coffin back on top of the firetruck. A STAT Flight helicopter then flew over in his honor. The truck rolled slowly north on Gleneida, a line of ambulances, firefighters and EMTs stretching behind it for almost a mile.
The engine paused one last time for Lamb in front of the Carmel firehouse before continuing to the cemetery. Lipton stood on the back of the truck, his right hand resting on the flag covering his friend’s coffin.