Firefighter Peter Langone, 41, was the driver for FDNY Engine Company 252 in Bushwick, Brooklyn. He was a rescue specialist and was a senior member of the house, available to dispense wisdom and to instill discipline in his younger colleagues. He loved what he did. He excelled at it. He was a man whose face you hoped to see when you were at your most helpless and most vulnerable. His acumen and his attitude calmed you and reassured you that everything was going to be okay.
FF Langone and his wife Terri were the proud parents of two daughters, Nikki and Karli, who were just nine and five respectively. Peter Langone loved his "girls". Terri, Nikki, and Karli were familiar faces around the firehouse and he loved spending his time off with his wife and daughters.
Prior to serving and protecting the people of New York City as a member of the FDNY, which he did for the final fourteen years of his life, Peter Langone served and protected the people of New York City as a member of the NYPD. He also served and protected the people of Roslyn, New York as a member of that community's volunteer fire department. One of his fellow Roslyn volunteers was his younger brother, Officer Thomas Langone of the NYPD's ESU Truck 10. Officer Langone was an eighteen-year veteran of the NYPD, during which time he had responded to tragedies including the bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 1995 and, closer to home, the first World Trade Center Bombing in February, 1993. The latter brought the brothers together as both responded to the World Trade Center on that cold, dreary February afternoon, and helped save lives.
Officer Langone and his wife JoAnn had two children, Caitlin and Brian, who were twelve and ten years old, respectively, in September 2001. He loved spending his time off with his family, including traveling on family vacations.
FF Peter Langone and Officer Thomas Langone each responded to lower Manhattan on Tuesday, September 11, 2001, because it was the part of their city on that terrible day in which their assistance and their expertise was most desperately needed. That morning, as they always did, the Brothers Langone gave all they had to save the lives of strangers. It was what they did. Neither knew any other way.
Three hundred forty three members of the FDNY were killed at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. Twenty-three members of the NYPD died alongside them. Peter Langone and Thomas Langone were among those brave first responders who died that morning, having laid down their own lives and having sacrificed the chance to watch their children grow up and to grow old with their wives to save others. It was the Langone Way. It was nothing short of extraordinary...
FF Peter Langone FDNY & Officer Thomas Langone NYPD
Photo Credit: Handout, Newsday.com
...and neither were the brothers.
-AK
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