Profile: Phil Power, the guy who has Shelter Island’s back

When Phil Power joined the Bellerose Terrace Fire Department in 1968, he was 18, just barely old enough to serve. Located near the Belt Parkway, the department saw a lot of action. He’s come a long way from the adrenaline-loving teenager who, by his own account, thought he was Superman.

Today, he’s the most experienced member of Shelter Island’s Fire Department where he’s been a member since 1974, our longest-serving Emergency Medical Technician, captain of the Shelter Island Rescue dive team, and the winner of the 2016 Lion’s Club Citizen of the Year Award, an honor he will receive at the Citizenship Award Dinner Meeting on Thursday, May 26.

If you find yourself in a tight spot on Shelter Island, whether on sea or land, Phil is the guy you want to help you out of it, a good reason to avoid having an emergency next Thursday night.

He grew up in Queens with his brother, Dennis, and sister, Debbie, but his Shelter Island ties go back three generations. For many years, Ketcham’s Store, a grocery and butcher shop, had been the family business of Phil’s father, Jerome, and operated on the spot where the Tuck Shop now stands. Phil’s mother, Roseanne Smith, also grew up on the Island and Phil and his siblings spent a lot of time at his grandmother’s house on Congdons Creek.

It was there he met Steve Lenox, whose family lived and farmed lima beans on the other side of the Creek, when both boys were in their early teens. Phil and his brother threw a few rocks at Steve by way of introduction.

“Stevie and I go back,” he said. “He taught my brother and me how to smoke corn silk.” (For the curious, when asked what happens when you smoke corn silk, Phil replied, “Nothing.”)

Phil and Steve have served together in the Fire Department for many years. About 40 years after the rock throwing, Phil responded to a cardiac emergency call at Steve’s Congdons Creek home along with fellow EMTs Mark Karnavogel and Sam Case.

“Good guys to see standing around your bed,” Steve said.

After graduating from Floral Park Memorial High School in 1967, Phil tried college and then spent four years in the Navy as an Airborne Early Warning squadron flight technician. His training included several weeks in the Navy SERE program learning survival, evasion and resistance techniques in case he went down in enemy territory,

“Not the most fun thing I’ve even been through,” he said. “We were told give them your gun, don’t look at their women. That was the extent of the briefing. I’m sure it’s gotten more specific.”

Fresh out of the Navy in 1973, Phil went to Shelter Island. He was tending bar at Candlelight Inn, when Phyllis Clark came in with her fiancé who, according to Phil, “was sitting in the corner like a lump,” possibly because the couple had just broken up.

Full of confidence if not tact he asked Phyllis, “Who’s the [deleted] in the corner?” and added, “One of the worst things you could ever do is get married.”

In spite of Phil’s advice to Phyllis, the couple married in 1976. They have two daughters, Theresa and Sharon, both graduates of the Shelter Island School, where Phyllis has taught music since 1978.

Phil worked as a ferry captain for many years, starting with South Ferry in 1975 and at the Cross Sound Ferry, where he was fired for union organizing, sued, won and was reinstated. He also worked as a captain on the North Ferry.

In his years as a firefighter, Phil has been through some harrowing experiences, including a fire that destroyed most of the Taplin residence on Menantic Road in the late 1970s.

“Probably the coldest one we ever fought,” he said. “We had problems with the hoses freezing and we froze the ladder in its position.”

Thirty firefighters responded, including Steve Lenox, who Phil described as looking like Santa Claus with a beard that became entirely encrusted with ice.

Phil was named Firefighter of the Year in 1999 and is now the safety officer for the department, a role that calls on his years of experience to assess specific dangers at the scene of fires.

When the Pine Barrens wildfire consumed almost 5,000 acres in 1995 it became the worst forest fire on the East End since the 19th century. Phil was one of 2,000 area firefighters who responded.

He remembers going into the burning area with the Dix Hills Fire Department. “It was spectacular, looking at a pine tree right before it exploded because all of the needles light up like a Christmas tree,” he said. “They glow, they turn bright white, and then the sap in them blows apart.”

Phil was in a team that went to the fire line on a truck, but when it rolled over a berm it got stuck, with the fire quickly covering ground toward them. Phil and other men abandoned the truck and made a run for another truck nearby, which was also moving away from the oncoming fire and unwilling to stop.

“I didn’t think this fat old bastard could run that far or that fast,” he said.

In 2011, with over 35 years of service, Phil was named Emergency Medical Technician of the Year.

“I’ve saved some lives, and I’ve delivered some babies on the way to Southampton Hospital,” he said.

Although both are high stakes situations, Phil said he prefers the maternity cases to “jumping up and down on some old guy’s chest.”

By far the most experienced EMT on the Island, he’s also a captain of the Shelter Island Dive Rescue team, a group consisting of fire department and police department professionals.

About 10 years ago, in the middle of planning for the wedding of his oldest daughter, Sharon, Phil discovered he had prostate cancer. “That was a life changer,” he said. “Dr. Kelt noticed something in a blood test, I had it removed, and I’m still here.”
Frank Adipietro, medical director for the Shelter Island ambulance, called Phil a few weeks ago and asked if he could come over to talk at 7 p.m, on a week night. Phil was worried enough to sit down while Frank was on his way.

When Frank walked through the door with Lions Club members Frank Vecchio and Jack Monaghan and said he had been chosen Lion of the Year, Phil was surprised, delighted and relieved.

So let’s keep it together next Thursday night, Shelter Island, so Phil can savor without interruption the recognition and thanks he has earned for being our most reliable and experienced first responder.