20-year SFFD veteran Michael Quinn may be getting terminated as a result of a June 29 accident in which he was suspected of drinking and driving, and a motorcyclist was severely injured. Quinn was driving a ladder truck at Fifth and Howard Streets around 11:30 p.m. that night, on his way to a call that turned out to be a false alarm, when he struck the motorcyclist, resulting in broken ribs and a punctured lung.
As Matier & Ross are reporting, Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White sent a letter last week to the Fire Commission requesting Quinn be terminated. The request came just a day before the coroner's confirmation that another SFFD vehicle was, in fact, responsible for the death of Asiana Airlines crash victim Ye Meng Yuan on July 6.
An attorney for Quinn calls the termination announcement "premature," given that a police investigation is ongoing, but initial reports have shown that Quinn was likely drunk on the job, even though he did not submit to a blood alcohol test for two hours after the accident.
Quinn fled the scene of the accident, despite being told by a captain to stay in his truck, and went to a nearby bar where he was seen downing pitchers of water. He reappeared at Station 1 two hours later, at which point he was given an alcohol test and arrested. At that point, his blood alcohol level was 0.13 percent, well above the 0.08 legal limit.
