The bullet that slammed into Baltimore police officer Robert G. Cirello's body armor in Patterson Park brought with it not only a rush of adrenaline but echoes of Sept. 11.
Cirello, now 27, remembers rushing to the World Trade Center towers in New York City nearly five years ago as a paramedic. When one of the smaller buildings collapsed that day, he remembers the dust cloud rushing toward him as he and his partners ducked behind an ambulance.
"It was an out-of-body experience," he recalled yesterday.
He felt that same way Thursday night. In the heart of Patterson Park in Southeast Baltimore, Cirello stepped out of his marked cruiser and into the darkness to confront two suspicious men. Suddenly, one of them bashed something on his head. Then a gun flashed at close range.
Cirello, a North Jersey native who joined Baltimore's police force a year after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, had been shot in the upper chest, but his body armor saved him from serious injury or death. He feared that the men would take his gun, but instead they ran off. He called on his radio for help and passed out.
"I wasn't freaking out," Cirello said by telephone. "It was more or less, this is what I got to do. It's what it is. It was the same exact feeling I had during 9/11. Kind of like being in a movie, watching myself.
"I really didn't hear anything. I felt stuff without pain. I felt [the bullet] hit me. ... . But I didn't feel any [pain] till I woke up."
Police and paramedics rushed him to Maryland Shock Trauma Center where he was treated for a head injury and for a quarter-size bruise on his chest. He got to the hospital about 10 p.m. By midnight, he was on his way home.
He considers himself a lucky man and talked about his body armor being his friend. This was the second time that his protective vest had come between him and a more violent result in Patterson Park.
In October 2004, Cirello and other officers were chasing down a man who was shooting into a crowd after a homecoming football game. Someone stabbed Cirello's armor with a knife or box cutter. The department awarded him a Silver Star.
Cirello remains upbeat about working as a police officer and about maintaining a constant presence in the park. In recent years, the neighborhoods around the park have become revitalized, but it remains an area dogged by crime issues.
