Retired FDNY firefighter John Elges, cited three times for bravery in his decades-long career, died Saturday from cancer caused by Ground Zero toxins, his family said.
He was 60.
Elges was diagnosed with brain and neck cancer in 2015, six years after he retired from the FDNY. The treatment became all-consuming after the disease metastasized to his lungs, his wife said.
“He had to go for 40 straight radiation treatments and chemotherapy every Monday,” Nuala Elges, 58, told the Daily News from their North Carolina home Tuesday. “He was supposed to start radiation again on Monday.”
“He loved me so much, I can’t believe he left me,” she sobbed.
Elges joined the FDNY in 1985, and spent the last fifteen years of his career at Ladder 134 in his hometown of Far Rockaway.
On Sept. 11, he joined the ranks of first-responders at Ground Zero to search for bodies, spending 10 days on the pile before returning home.
“He said to me that day when he came home, ‘No matter where we are in life, please make sure I’m always in New York for September 11th,’” his wife recalled. Four weeks later, the couple got married.