Malibu paddle-out to remember local firefighter
Hundreds of firefighters, friends and family members gathered here on Monday afternoon to honor a retired Santa Monica fire captain who died last month after a four-year battle with cancer.
Friends and colleagues remembered Santa Monica Fire Department Capt. Daniel Bendiksen as a gregarious outdoorsman who loved to surf, ski and fish. They also recalled him as a quick-witted friend who enjoyed teasing others.
“Dan’s life was the kind of life that demands notice,” said retired fire chief Ettore Berardinelli, who delivered a eulogy for Bendiksen. “It was a life characterized by responsibility, humor — but most of all, generosity.”
“Dan’s life was the kind of life that demands notice.” — — ETTORE BERARDINELLI Retired fire chief
Firefighters presented Rudi Bendiksen, Bendiksen’s wife of 40 years, with the flag that flew above Bendiksen’s fire station — Company No. 1 on Seventh Street — as well as badge No. 19, retired in his honor, and a red fire captain’s hat. Firefighters then stood at attention as a silver fire bell was rung 10 times.
SMFD Fire Chief Jim Hone invited the audience to stand and share their stories about Bendiksen, who by all accounts was a man’s man — a loving husband and father who worked hard, and played even harder. More than a dozen people spoke, most of them choking back tears or speaking through them.
2F1,“Dan would not like to be involved with this solemn crowd,” said Paul Stein, a retired SMFD training officer. Stein then compared birth to death: At birth, everyone is celebrating, but the individual is crying. At death, everyone is crying but the individual — if they’ve lived a good life — celebrates elsewhere, he said.
“We’re crying now,” Stein added. “We love you.”
Bendiksen, known to most as “Dano” or “Danny,” was an accomplished surfboard shaper who worked with Bing Copeland. Many of the people who attended the ceremony wore Hawaiian aloha shirts. The stage of the civic auditorium was adorned with floral wreaths, and a surfboard with stars and stripes airbrushed onto it. Hawaiian music played during a photo montage of Bendiksen’s life.
Though he didn’t join the fire department until he was 33, Bendiksen quickly earned the respect and admiration of his peers and superiors, and was promoted to fire captain in 1979. Before retiring in December of 2001, he earned the Medal of Valor award from the California State Firefighters Association for his physical actions in the rescue of a distraught citizen who threatened to commit suicide.
Bendiksen, 63, who lived in the Broad Beach area of Malibu, died March 26 at Saint John’s Hospital. Friends will meet at Surfrider Beach in Malibu at 9:30 a.m. today and paddle out into the lineup in his honor.
Bendiksen is survived by his wife Rudi and his mother Berneta. The Bendiksens’ daughter died 11 years ago in an automobile accident.
“You wouldn’t call someone like him popular,” Rudi Bendiksen said after the service, while friends and colleagues shared more stories over beers, wine and food. “He was everybody’s hero — and certainly mine. He was my very best friend. He was a gallant warrior to fight this for four years.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on April 13, 2004. Read the original PDF.