LAGUNA BEACH : Among Many Heroes, Fire Dept. Honors 2

It’s hard for Kris Head to describe what it was like to battle the ferocious firestorm that ripped through Laguna Beach in October.

“It was such an incredible experience, I hate to attach one or two words to it and shortchange what it was really about,” he said. “It’s definitely something you would call a career fire.”

And with so many other firefighters also on the front lines, Head said he was startled when a message flickered across his computer screen recently saying his peers had named him Fireman of the Year.

“When I read it I said, ‘This is someone’s idea of a joke,’ ” Head said. “You know how firemen are.”

But it was no joke.

The Laguna Beach Fire Department has chosen the 33-year-old Oceanside resident for the honor, and had named Api Weinert the 1993 Reserve Fireman of the Year.

Laguna Beach Fire Chief Rich Dewberry admits it was particularly tough to single out only two firefighters in a year when so many distinguished themselves by fighting an inferno that damaged or destroyed more than 400 homes and sent a city fleeing.

“It’s pretty hard to judge who out-heroed somebody else,” Dewberry said. “Everybody was just doing their jobs and laying it on the line.”

In fact, Head and Weinert were selected in large part for their efforts during the weeks and months following the fire.

Head, for example, developed the post-fire Laguna Storm Emergency Operations Plan, which included preparing an emergency evacuation procedure, an erosion control plan and an emergency resource list, and compiling a registry of residents who were elderly or at home alone.

Weinert, 24, also was instrumental in the success of the post-firestorm operations, Dewberry said. He maintained records needed for the city to be reimbursed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Dewberry calls him the department’s “computer guru.”

Head joined the department in December, 1984, and became the emergency medical services division chief in 1992. Much of the time during the fire, he responded to paramedic calls throughout the city.

Weinert joined the Laguna Beach Fire Reserves in July, 1988, and has filled a temporary full-time position with the department, Dewberry said.

Weinert, who was born in Laguna Beach and still lives there, said he never in his “wildest dreams or nightmares” imagined he would be fighting such a blaze in his hometown. And he said it is “pretty spectacular” to be honored for his efforts.