Marine killed in Afghanistan was decorated NYC firefighter

Author : Sam Published: April 09, 2019

A U.S. Marine killed in Afghanistan was a decorated member of the Fire Department of New York. Christopher Slutman, a 15-year FDNY member, was among three American service members killed by a roadside bomb on Monday. (April 9)
AP, AP

A firefighter and father of three with ties to Delaware was one of three U.S. service members killed Monday by an explosion near Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan.

Staff Sgt. Christopher Slutman and his fellow troops were struck by a roadside bomb during a convoy Monday. The names of the other service members killed in the attack have not yet been released.

The Taliban has since taken credit for the explosion that also wounded three other U.S. service members and an Afghan contractor who were evacuated and are receiving medical treatment.

Slutman had a long career as a firefighter, as a volunteer with the Kentland Volunteer Fire Department in Landover, Maryland, and with the New York City Fire Department Ladder 27 in the Bronx.

A New York City Fire Department truck is parked outside a home believed to be Slutmans’ near Wilmington.

Julie Moore Graden, a neighbor of the Slutmans in Delaware, told the New York Post that Christopher and his wife, Shannon, were “soulmates.”

“He was always smiling, never complained about being away from his children,” she told the Post.

“You could just see how much he loved Shannon and his girls,” she said.

Slutman grew up in Maryland, where his father, Fletcher Slutman, had worked as a firefighter. He wanted to follow in his dad’s footsteps, and went to New York to do it, commuting there and keeping a place in the state while his family stayed in Delaware, his father said.

A woman who walked out of the house about 2:45 p.m. Tuesday spoke briefly to reporters about Slutman.

“He was the best person,” she said, who declined to identify herself. “He was a wonderful father. He is forever a hero.”

The woman said the family was doing as best as could be expected.

It was Chris Slutman’s work in the Bronx where, in 2014, he won the Fire Chiefs Association Memorial Medal for rescuing an unconscious woman from the seventh floor of a high-rise apartment building, according to the Uniformed Firefighters Association of Greater New York.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio commended the “fallen hero” before a press conference Tuesday regarding the city’s measles outbreak, and remembered presenting the medal to Slutman in 2014.

“This, unquestionably, is an example of the measure of this man, Christopher Slutman, an American hero, a New York hero, and we mourn his loss today.”

De Blasio ordered flags across New York City be flown at half-mast in a tribute to Slutman.

It is with a heavy heart that we offer our sincerest condolences to the family, friends and loved ones of Firefighter Christopher Slutman Ladder 27, a fifteen year member of the department and a friend to all in both of his firehouses. Christopher will be greatly missed. RIP pic.twitter.com/3CxPjTsGNw

— UFA NYC Firefighters (@UFANYC) April 9, 2019

A Facebook post by the Kentland department’s fire chief, Oleg Pelekhaty, detailed Slutman’s rise in the volunteer fire company as well as his dedication as a family man.

“Through this trying time, we will remember Chris for the father, husband, brother, son, and friend that he was, the moral character he displayed daily, and the courage and conviction to serve his fellow Americans, both at home and abroad,” the post stated.

“We ask for your thoughts and prayers for his firehouse brothers, his fellow Marines, his friends – but most of all, his family.”