A 19-year-old firefighter who died fighting a blaze in a disused building in 1976 should be fittingly remembered as the hero he was, a former colleague has said.
John Nichol is thought to be the youngest firefighter to have lost his life while on duty in the UK or Ireland.
The teenager died when a disused building in Upper English Street in Armagh collapsed on top of him, while he was fighting a blaze believed to have been started deliberately.
His colleague Desy Moynes was also trapped under the burning rubble when was rescued.
He miraculously survived with only minor injuries, but the death of his close friend in the same incident has stayed with him throughout his life.
The story of John Nichol features in the BBC documentary On The Frontline, looking at how various services carried out their duties during the Troubles.
Mr Moynes, who served with the Fire Service from 1976 until 2004, has since campaigned to have his friend properly remembered and managed to have a police investigation into the incident reopened.
However, the passage of time and the lack of proper records meant that it closed without shedding any light on who may have been responsible for the malicious blaze.
"It was about two in the morning when we got a call to a disused greengrocers shop, we eventually started to get the fire beat down and we went into the building," recalled Mr Moynes.
"John was fire brigade mad, he just loved it, he loved the uniform, he loved the fire engines, when John got his hands on a jet you couldn't have prised it off him."
Mr Moynes said he recalls someone shouting at them to get out out of the building, but seconds later it collapsed on top of them.
"There was an awful weight pushing down, I was trying to breath but couldn't, then the heat started and it was like being in a pizza oven," he said.
The two were trapped in rubble for over three hours before being discovered by members of the fire service who risked their own life to pull them from the building. However, John Nichol had died in the crush.
Mr Moynes said that night has stayed with him. "Nowadays they call it survivors' guilt ... he's there and he gets killed and I get a sore left arm, what justice is there in that."
John Nichol was buried with full honours. His coffin carried on the back of a fire engine flanked by hundreds of members of the Northern Ireland Fire Authority, the service he had been a member of for less than a year.
However, Mr Moynes said there should be a proper record of his loss and a fitting memorial erected to his teenage friend.
"He would have been a good fireman, he would have been good for the community", Mr Moynes added.
Firefighters on the Frontline is available on the BBC iPlayer.
