A Modern-Day Rasputin

FDNY Lt. Joe Torillo with Billy Blazes

Photo Credit:  Melissa Benno

Joe Torillo spent twenty-five years serving and protecting the people of New York City for twenty-five years as a member of the FDNY, including fifteen at Ten House, which was located directly across from the World Trade Center.  He was badly injured in a fire on New Years Eve 1996 and while he was convalescing he was assigned to do so in the Office of Fire Safety Education.  

He took to the assignment.  So much so in fact that eight months into his "light-duty" position, he was named the Director of the program and took to becoming the co-designer of a state-of-the-art children's fire safety learning center, which opened in October 2020.  They named it "The Fire Zone".   In January 2001, Lt. Torillo started working with Fisher-Price to help the company design a firefighter action figure to join as part of its Rescue Heroes lineup, which was named "Billy Blazes".   

On the morning of September 11, 2001, Lt. Torillo was on his way to "The Fire Zone" for a press conference with Fisher-Price to announce Billy Blazes' arrival.  He was on his way there when the North Tower was struck at 8:46 am.  His immediate reaction was one of concern for his brothers at Ten House so he stopped heading towards "The Fire Zone" and diverted straight into hell.  

He had just put on borrowed bunker gear when the South Tower was struck at 9:03 am.  Lt. Torillo's background included a degree in Structural Engineering, which informed his opinion that everyone in the South Tower above the jet's impact point was doomed to die and that both Towers were going to collapse.  

He was helping rescue those trapped in the Towers when, at 9:59 am, the South Tower collapsed.  He was buried alive in the rubble with a fractured skull, broken ribs, broken arm, crushed spine and heavy internal bleeding.  Shortly after being found alive in the rubble, they removed him on a long spine board and placed him on the deck of a boat on the Hudson River in anticipation of getting him to a hospital.  Sadly, the North Tower had other plans for Lt. Torillo.  

The North Tower collapsed while emergency personnel were trying to hold his split scalp together.  He was once again buried alive.  For the second time.  In one morning.  Amazingly, incredibly, and almost unbelievably, this modern-day Rasputin lived to tell the tale.  

Three years later, he wanted nothing more than to return to work.  The doctor told him that he would not clear him to return to duty.  Still, he found a way to help.  He became a speaker, traveling across the United States to speak to groups (including school kids), educating them about fire safety and reminding them of the men and women in our society who put themselves in harm's way to save others, and who do so every day.  

-AK