The city held a sorrowful bunting ceremony Sunday morning for Frederick Whiteside, a veteran FDNY EMT killed by a heart attack Friday while working in the Bronx.
“He was a great father, he was my best friend,” fellow EMT Calvin Stone said about the 43-year-old father who spent 22 years with the department before his shocking on-duty death at the 911 dispatch center.
“He was always saying, ‘I’m just peachy!’” Stone told the audience as he wiped away tears inside the FDNY’s hub in the Bronx.
Dozens of first responders gave Whiteside a final salute as bagpipers wailed through “Amazing Grace” and two men raised the black bunting.
Whiteside, of Brooklyn, joined the FDNY in April 2002 — just seven months after 9/11 — and spent his career helping residents of the Bronx and Brooklyn as part of EMS Divisions 2 and 3.
He had been working in the dispatch center since 2019.
“He excelled — he was truly able to make a connection with the crews in the field, having worked an ambulance himself,” Deputy Assistant Chief Denise Werner said at the ceremony. “He will be deeply missed.”
Whiteside is survived by his wife, daughter, mother and brother, according to city officials.
As dedicated as he was to helping New Yorkers in need, it was the job of being a dad that Whiteside reveled most, one of his colleagues said Sunday.
“Fred’s best and most important role was dad,” said EMT Ashanti Robinson. “I’ve never seen someone so happy to become a father. Every time you asked Fred about his daughter, his face would light up — Fred loved being a dad.”
Whiteside’s death was a “heartbreaking loss for New York’s Bravest, and our entire city,” Mayor Eric Adams said in a statement over the weekend.
“EMT Whiteside spent his career helping those in need, saving lives of New Yorkers,” Adams said. “We join the entire Fire Department and every New Yorker in mourning his loss, and pray for EMT Whiteside, his family, and his friends.”
Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanagh also described the late first responder as a “dedicated public servants and front-line worker.”
“We are saddened by his sudden passing and join his family and friends in mourning his loss,” she said.