A lead firefighter from Navy Region Northwest Fire and Emergency Services saved a life last summer but it wasn’t in the Northwest and he didn’t jump off a fire truck to do it.

Richard Rivers donated his bone marrow to the Department of Defense Marrow Donor Program in Fairfax, Va., where it was given to a man with leukemia. Rivers got the word five days ago that the patient was out of the hospital and doing well.

“I feel awesome,” Rivers said of the procedure. “Most of the people around here (Fire House 71) are oriented around helping people and this is just a continuation of that.”

All of the 40 people at the fire station volunteered to go on the bone marrow registry after now retired Battalion Chief Mick Lamar told them he had leukemia in 2004.

Rivers said technicians from the Navy Hospital Oak Harbor swabbed their gums and sent the results to the national registry. They didn’t think much more about it.

Neither did Rivers until he got a call saying he might be a match.

More blood was drawn, shipped back to Washington D.C. then Rivers flew back to Washington D.C. for more blood work and a complete physical.

“They wanted to make sure I was a healthy candidate,” Rivers said. “You are giving your immune system to somebody.”

The official name for the program is the C.W. Bill Young/Department of Defense Marrow Donor Center. It is used to recruit donors from active duty military, their family members and civil service employees. The reason is the military is the largest source of whole blood donations and more than anyone, meets the strict health and age requirements. The DOD Marrow Donor Program also pays all expenses for the donor once he or she is selected.

Rivers said he was chosen to donate peripheral blood stem cells (PBSC) so he went to the aphaeresis (involves removing whole blood from a patient or donor) center at Fairfax Pathology Associates in Fairfax.

Every day for six days he received an injection of a synthetic hormone to build up his cells. Then on the sixth day, needles were stuck is both arms, the right to collect his blood where it passed through a machine that separates out the blood stem cells then returned it through a needle in the left arm.

Rivers said it wasn’t too painful of a process but it was time-consuming. Even though the process was easy, he admitted that he spent the next day floating in a pool because his joints were sore.

“All you had to do was show up,” he said. DOD and the doctors took care of everything.

On the eight day, Aug. 19, Rivers was done and flew home to Washington.

“Many are listed but only a few are called,” said Caitlin Ross, Workup Coordinator for the C.W. Bill Young DOD Marrow Donor Program. There needs to be a huge number of potential donors listed on the registry because of the vast genetic diversity of the American population.

“I just want to thank him again for his willingness to help this patient and give him a second chance.” Ross said. “Mr. Rivers is one of about 500 service members who are matched to a patient through the DoD Marrow Donor Program and donate bone marrow each year.

According to Ross, about 600,000 service member have registered since the program started in 1986, but many more donors are needed to ensure that all patients are able to locate a match.

“I’m proud and honored to have Rich as a member of our organization,” said Rivers’ boss, Scott Steil, Assistant Fire Chief-Operations for Fire House 71. “Rivers’ decision to go above and beyond his firefighting duties as a bone-marrow donor truly reflects the true character of this man.”

Rivers was just glad to get back home. He was born and raised in Washington. His 15-year old Golden retriever, Willy, was happy to have him back as were the guys at the station with whom he’s worked for almost 20 years.