MC boy inspires FD 7 firefighters

  • By Katie Murdoch Enterprise editor
  • Tuesday, March 9, 2010 8:26pm

A team of Fire District 7 firefighters participated in the Scott Firefighter Stair Climb at the Columbia Center in Seattle on March 7 to help raise money for a Mill Creek boy battling leukemia.

The Columbia Center climb is open to firefighters across the nation to help raise funding for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. The climb demands participants trek up 69 flights, or more than 1,300 steps, wearing full bunker gear weighing approximately 50 pounds.

The public is invited to attend the Big Climb on March 21, also at the Columbia Center. The Big Climb is the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society’s largest fundraiser. In 2009, 6,000 participants ran, walked and, well, crawled up the stairs to raise more than $1.3 million to fight blood cancers, according to their Web site. This year their goal is to raise $1.4 million.

FD 7 Firefighter Bill Ekse this year marked his 12th year participating, leading a team of 20 firefighters during the March 7 climb. His wife is set to lead a team of 25 during the March 21 climb. Bill Ekse’s team participated to raise money for the society and to help a Mill Creek family pay for medical bills after their son was diagnosed with leukemia.

Through friends, Ekse became acquainted with 9-year-old Colton Matter, who was diagnosed with leukemia in September. Colton had a bone marrow transplant in January. The boy is now home and attended the climb, where firefighters planned to present him with his own bunker gear.

Ekse had a friend who passed away many years ago from the same type of cancer afflicting Colton. When he found out about the stair climb, Ekse said he began urging other firefighters to participate and raise money.

“I took the sports aspect of it to get people involved and aware,” he said. “Most people don’t realize what families go through.”

Ekse said the only way to ask people for money is to make a big event out of it.

Last summer, the department had a contest where firefighters to compete on stair mills.

“We see (people with cancer) all the time, we notice them, but we don’t get to meet or help them other than what the job pays,” he said. “We want to let people know we want to help and let them know we care.”

Colton’s mom, Suzy Matter, said the support from FD 7 and the community has been a blessing and it amazes her how everyone in the community is connected.

Matter said she remembers driving past the station and seeing a reader board showing support for Colton and his family.

“I had to stop driving and call my husband,” she said. “How did they know?”

Colton’s attitude through the ordeal has been a blessing and he has never played the pity card, his mom said.

Matter said the first 100 days after a bone marrow transplant are the most critical and doctors ask patients to count each day up to one year after the surgery. On the day of the March 7 climb, Colton had reached Day 59. Colton has been playing basketball and getting ready for home school, she said.

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