BRIGANTINE, N.J. — The sudden death of a New Jersey fire chief left a community in mourning Sunday night.
The Press Atlantic reported that Brigantine Fire Chief James Holl, 51, died unexpectedly Sunday. Holl was a 27-year veteran of the department and saw the city’s firefighters through some of their toughest assignments before, during and after Hurricane Sandy, according to the report.
“The entire community mourns the loss of Chief Holl, and our thoughts and prayers are with his family and the members of the fire department who called him both chief and friend,” Mayor Phil Guenther said Sunday evening.
Holl was the first EMT to be employed by the department in 1979 and also worked as a medic, U.S. Air Force flight nurse, an emergency room nurse and as a forensic medical investigator, according to the report.
According to the department’s website, Holl worked with the fire prevention bureau and served as a fire inspector and fire investigator. Holl was also one of the original members of the department’s water response team as a rapid-deployment search and rescue scuba diver.
Holl held the rank of lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Air Force Reserve, 514th Air Mobility Wing, and was deployed to care for the injured after the Kobar Towers bombing during Operation Southern Watch in 1996, the 9/11 attacks in 2001 and served a five-month deployment to the Middle East in 2003 during Operation Iraqi Freedom, according to the report.
His most recent deployment was in 2008 to Tunisia for a Joint Chiefs of Staff mission to provide and exchange medical skills, techniques and procedures between members of the U.S. Air Force and Army and Tunisian military health services, according to the report.