Boy Scouts BBQ, Remember Great Role Model

The Boy Scouts of Troop 240 blasted off into summer with a barbecued filled with food, fun and rocket-launching, but there were somber moments as well as they reflected on the loss of a great role model and father of one of their own.

The scouts and their families spent the evening at on June 6 playing games, enjoying food from the grill and talking about the past year.

"We had 11 boys make Eagle Scout and two more who recently submitted their paperwork," said Scout Master Gary Port. "I have no doubt that they will make it."

Port's son, Sam, is among the scouts that earned this award this year, along with James Kaminski, Javon Vales, Kaliem Ried, Matthew McCarthy and Mark DeFilippis.

Taking a break from shooting off rockets in the park, DeFilippis recalled one of the most memorable trips the scouts  took this year, which was when the late Malverne Deputy Mayor James Callahan - whose son is also a Boy Scout - took about 20 members of the troop on an exciting field trip.

In March, only weeks before he was hospitalized, Callahan invited them to the headquarters of Nassau County's Office of Emergency Management, where he served as commissioner. There, he demonstrated bone scanners, introduced them to two canine units of bomb-sniffing dogs and showed them a mobile command center equipped with features most had only seen in the movies.

He also taught them about Community Emergency Response Training (CERT) and allowed them to play the roles of disaster victims, as trainees rescued them from "collapsed buildings" and "chemical attacks," and bandaged them up.

"He was pretty awesome," DeFilippis, 17, said."He knew how to protect us from so many things."

Port remembered that day too, saying Callahan was "bursting with energy. He was like a kid with his toys."

He added, "He clearly loved what he did and the boys admired him."