City names Bay Ridge corner in memory of hero firefighter
Such was Firefighter Michael Behette’s dedication to duty that when the Sept. 11 attacks took place he drove all the way from Florida, where he was on vacation, to New York to help with the recover effort at Ground Zero. He couldn’t get a flight because all of the airlines had been grounded, so he decided to rent a car. He drove 24 hours straight until he reached New York.
Behette, who was assigned to Ladder 172 in Bensonhurst, spent many months working on “the pile,” as the World Trade Center site was called. In 2011, 10 years after the attacks, Behette, who had never smoked a cigarette in his life, was diagnosed with metastatic lung cancer. Councilman Vincent Gentile (D-Bay Ridge-Dyker Heights-Bensonhurst) said the illness was directly related to his exposure to the toxic air all those months working on the pile at Ground Zero. The air was filled with dust from the pulverized buildings, Gentile said.
Behette died on Sept. 17, 2012 at age 55.
On May 17, hundreds of people gathered at the corner of Fifth Avenue and 85th Street in Bay Ridge for a ceremony marking the official re-naming of the corner “Michael G. Behette 9/11 Memorial Way.” Behette’s mother Madeline, his brother Anthony, and his sister Marguerite were on hand to see the posthumous tribute.