The Seattle Fire Department is saying that what looked like a noose is just a knot. However, they didn’t find who created the knot. They sent out information after they ended their investigation into the possible racist gesture. The noose was found during Black History Month last year inside Seattle Fire Station 24.
For three straight years now, a noose has been found. However, no one has been caught and not much more than an investigation has been conducted. There has been no finding of any malicious intent. Interestingly enough, investigators thought someone might have a justifiable reason for making the knot and putting it in the rope cubby.
A Seattle Fire Department firefighter reported finding a noose in 2020 at Fire Station 17, located in the University District. Also in 2020, a firefighter noticed Fire Station 24’s old racist patch in the station’s 2020 yearbook which was oddly disseminated at the start of 2022. The patch design used lettering with a sun cross, also known as Odin’s Cross, which the Anti Defamation League recognizes as a hate symbol.
But, once again, investigators found nothing wrong. They blamed it on a proofreading error, according to an email from Seattle Fire Chief Harold Scoggins to SFD staff in October 2022. In an email, Scoggins announced the results of the investigation into the reported noose found at Fire Station 24. Scoggins stated that though it would be easy to “move forward as though no real harm had been done, it would dismiss the very real impact that members of our fire department family experienced.”
A solution after the incidents push the idea that the department limits the types of knots Seattle firefighters use. The department also ordered stickers to cover up the racist patch in the yearbooks. They also sent information showing that SFD deleted the station’s old patch from department files. The racist patch was created under a previous Fire Station 24 fire captain. Another firefighter designed the racist patch in 2017, according to the investigation report.
