9/11
Firefighter Commits Suicide
LARRY CELONA and TODD VENEZIA
Courtesy of The New York Post
A veteran firefighter assigned to one of 9/11's hardest-hit FDNY
units shot and killed himself yesterday in front of a makeshift
shrine he built to friends and colleagues lost in the terror attack,
sources said.
Gary Celentani, a member of Squad 288, which lost eight members
at the World Trade Center, became the Fire Department's first post-Sept.
11 suicide when he put a rifle to his chest and pulled the trigger
at about 6:40 p.m. Wednesday in his basement apartment on 170th
Street in Flushing, Queens, sources said.
Cops said they found Celentani's body before a shrine that included
the photos of numerous firefighters and a police officer. They also
found a suicide note in which Celentani said a recent breakup with
his girlfriend drove him to kill himself. Friends said he also was
deeply affected by the recent death of his mother, Mary. "Gary
was this big, strong guy, but he was sensitive and loved his friends," said former Capt. John Vigiano, whose sons John, a firefighter,
and Joseph, a cop, died in the WTC attack and were close friends
of Celentani.
Celentani was a pallbearer at Joseph Vigiano's funeral. The brothers'
pictures were among the images that Celentani, who was undergoing
department counseling, kept in his shrine.
"I definitely think Sept. 11 affected him, as it affected a
lot of young men and women who lost co-workers," Vigiano said.
Vigiano had spoken to the 33-year-old Long Island native last weekend
- and Celentani offered to help his late friends' father around
the house.
"That was the kind of guy he was," Vigiano said. "Just
call him and he'd come over and help you."
Celentani was a city firefighter since 1996, although the FDNY could
not immediately determine where he was assigned on Sept. 11, 2001.
In 1999, as a member of Ladder 27, Celentani wielded an extinguisher
to knock down a roiling fire in a hallway so his captain could save
a woman from a building, according to department records.
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