Last year's greatest heroes were undoubtedly the firefighters who participated in the search and rescue mission of the country's single largest act of terrorism, the April 19, 1995, Oklahoma City bombing of the Murrah Federal Building.
A special tribute was made to them last August, at the International Association of Fire Fighters'(IAFF) conference, the J.P. Redmond Symposium, in San Francisco.
Nearly 1,500 firefighters came for the bi-annual technical conference, but one of the highlights was a 15-minute videotape, created by the full-service Washington, D.C., PR firm, The Kamber Group (TKG).
The tape, which cost $22,000 to produce, chronicled the 17-day search and rescue mission of the rescue teams, made up of 1,000 Oklahoma City firefighters and others from Florida, Virginia, California and Arizona.
Marty Sonnenberg, senior vice president and executive producer of TKG, worked with employees to collect the research, live footage and interviews necessary to complete the project to be presented at the IAFF conference.
Conducting Research
When TKG was first approached by its eight-year-old client, the IAFF, Sonnenberg says he had ideas about what the theme of the videotape should be. Within the next week, John Hansen, assistant chief of the Oklahoma City Fire Department, came to Washington to discuss the project. Sonnenberg said that it all didn't "gel" until Hansen presented his sources and footage to TKG.
"I'd seen a couple other pieces on the bombing, and I thought I wanted to do something totally different (by focusing on the firefighters)," said Sonnenberg. "After spending a few hours with John, I saw the impact the bombing had on the firefighters."
He decided to take the viewer through the incident and show the intense physical and emotional conditions the firefighters endured.
Hansen gave TKG media contacts to find footage that local news stations and the Fire Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) had recorded throughout the rescue mission. Sonnenberg said that people were generous in giving him their coverage, because it was for thefirefighters. It would have been different if the tape were for broadcast or commercial use, he said.
TKG has its own in-house production department, where the team created the tape, which took three to four weeks to make. TKG has also made tapes for other clients, including for The White House Conference on Travel and Tourism; and the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association's Wireless '96 convention.
Included is live footage of: the damaged building, the public's reaction to the bombing, the damaged five-block radius, a memorial service that the firefighters held for the victims and a speech by Al Whitehead, president of IAFF, honoring the firefighters after the bombing.
At the end of the tape, TKG included facts about the bombing, such as the number of deaths and injuries of adults and children, the amount of financial damage the bombing produced and the numerous states that participated in the rescue, ranging from New York to Calif., with dozens in between.
Results
The videotape, which is used by TKG for in-house promotions, won the 1995 Communicator Award for Excellence in the media/documentary category from Mercomm.
The piece was shown at other firefighter conventions and conferences, and for internal communications within various fire departments.
"The highest compliment we got was when people said it was the most realistic piece they had seen," said Sonnenberg. After it was shown, he says "everyone just sat there for about 30 seconds or so, it was so quiet in there, you could hear a pin drop."
He adds that, "in a way the tape is tough to watch, it brings back memories that you want to forget and don't want to forget...but it means a lot to the firefighters."
Hansen said that "the brotherhood within the Oklahoma City Fire Department was very evident...firefighters are the best kept secret in our country in terms of helpers."
Talking to Hansen before he started working on the tape really helped TKG figure out what tone the videotape should have. "The closer you can get to the people that have access to the information, the more realistic the piece will be," said Sonnenberg.
(The Kamber Group, 202/223-8700; The International Association of Fire Fighters, 202/737-8484)
Video Wrap Up
The Kamber Group's 15-minute videotape tribute to firefighter heroism included:
- How the firefighters searched for survivors without causing harm to themselves;
- The organization and control the firefighters showed by handlng medical responders, law enforcements and volunteer firefighters from other counties;
- A tribute to the firefighters from the president of the International Association of Fire Fighters; and
- A memorial service the firefighters held for the 168 victims of the bombing.