Firefighter Takes Would-Be Robber Down, Video Shows

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A young man with a makeshift mask pushes a firefighter out of the way in an attempt to rob a gas station.

But it turned out to be a bad move

The firefighter immediately grabs the man and takes him to the ground. He then subdues him until help arrives before a police officer apprehends the man and puts handcuffs on him.

The firefighter was identified as Mansfield firefighter and former Marine, Daniel Gaskey, reported NBC News.

“My first thought is, ‘What are you doing pushing me?’” he told NBC of the incident.

But as soon as he realized it was a robbery, he acted immediately.

“He then said, ‘I’m not fighting anymore,’” said Gaskey, who was a Marine for eight years, adding that he has a wife and two kids.

The suspect, 19-year-old Daniel Bearden, was arrested and charged with aggravated robbery, police told NBC.

Midlothian police Capt. John D. Spann said the department appreciated Gaskey’s actions.

“Sometimes there’s a job that needs to get done,” Gaskey said. “You have to be willing to stand up and help each other.”

Study: 68 Percent of Firefighters Fall Victim to Cancer

According to the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), more than 160 firefighters died in the line of duty in 2013 and 2014. It turns out that cancer claims many more lives of firefighters than any real-time danger on the job, says the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), a division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“A combined population of 30,000 firefighters from three large cities had higher rates of several types of cancers, and of all cancers combined, than the U.S. population as a whole, researchers from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) and colleagues found,” the organization stated in 2016.

“The new findings are generally consistent with the results of several previous, smaller studies,” the release added. “Because the new study had a larger study population followed for a longer period of time, the results strengthen the scientific evidence for a relation between firefighting and cancer, the researchers said.”

Researchers noted the cancer rates for 29,993 firefighters in San Francisco, Chicago and Philadelphia between 1950 and 2009.

They found that:

-“Cancers of the respiratory, digestive, and urinary systems accounted mostly for the higher rates of cancer seen in the study population. The higher rates suggest that firefighters are more likely to develop those cancers.”

- “The population of firefighters in the study had a rate of mesothelioma two times greater than the rate in the U.S. population as a whole. This was the first study ever to identify an excess of mesothelioma in U.S. firefighters. The researchers said it was likely that the findings were associated with exposure to asbestos, a known cause of mesothelioma.”