FAIRMONT, W.Va. (WBOY) — First responders from Marion County and beyond lined up outside Fairmont Saturday afternoon to pay their respects to a fallen state trooper.
Sgt. Cory Maynard, 37, of the West Virginia State Police was shot and killed on Friday while responding to a shooting call in Mingo County. As a tissue donor, Maynard was transported from Charleston to Pittsburgh Saturday, and the route passed under the Fairmont Gateway bridge.
Emergency service vehicles and dozens of EMS volunteers and employees lined I-79 as the convoy carrying Maynard’s body drove by. A flag was also suspended from two firetruck ladders over the Fairmont bridge.
“First responders, fire, EMS, police, we’re all brothers and sisters in this whole thing, so when something happens to one of us we’re all affected in the same way,” JB Eakle, a volunteer firefighter for Valley Volunteer Fire Department in Marion County, said. “Regardless of the situation, they’re there. If it’s a bad situation, if it’s a good situation, it doesn’t matter. They don’t pick what they go to. They’re there because we need them.”
Maynard, who was originally from Belfry, Kentucky, was sworn into the West Virginia State Police on October 9, 2007, and is survived by his wife and two children.
Firefighters told 12 News that every fire department in the county was present in some way at the procession and that this is a practice observed throughout the state.