Student Journalist at Xavier H.S. Pens Moving Story About Fallen Fighter

The then first deputy mayor, Randy Mastro, was visiting a firehouse in Israel when he learned of the tragic death of Patrick Brady in a fire in Brooklyn.

Brady, 42, went into cardiac arrest and died while battling a fire on the roof of a building in Brownsville on Nov. 8, 2025.

Aides, Mastro recalled during a eulogy at Brady’s funeral at St. Francis de Salles Church, urged him to get back to the city right away. “This is going to be the big one,” he was told. “He was like the mayor of Rockaway.”

Press reports at the time mentioned that Brady had graduated from Xavier High School in 2001. That was all the motivation that Hudson Dew, a senior and editor of the school paper, the Xavier Review needed to embark on one of the hardest but most moving stories of his young journalism career, writing a tribute entitled, “A Life of Service and Bravery” Remembering Patrick Brady 01.”

The story, posted ten days after the Nov. 15 funeral, was about a man Dew never knew in life but came to admire after his passing. “It was heartbreaking,” recalled Dew in a recent interview at the school, “but it was also heartwarming to know he had effected so many people in so many ways.”

“Sirens and smoke were constants in Patrick Brady’s life, but for the people who knew him, it wasn’t the chaos of the job that defined him,” Dew wrote in his piece. “It was the steady, unshakeable sense of duty he carried everywhere he went. Brady, a 2001 Xavier graduate and firefighter with FDNY Ladder Company 120, died last week while responding to a call on Kings Highway in Brooklyn. His passing left a gap that stretched far beyond the firehouse on Watkins Street and back through the classrooms and locker rooms where he first learned what service truly meant.”

For Dew, who grew up on the Upper East Side and attended Loyola Middle School before heading to Xavier High School, it was full immersion into the fire department culture that percolates through Rockaway Peninsula where many police and firefighters have made their homes over the years. And in the course of his story, Dew learned that many Xavier alumni including Patrick O’Grady ’11 and Ryan Wunder ’07, served alongside Brady at his firehouse in Brownsville, one of the busiest in the city.

Battalion Chief Scott Coyne put words to what so many felt, wrote Dew. “It is a position that touches everyone, and that is just what Pat did—that night, and with his life,” he said. “Nothing steered him. Nothing held him up. Patrick made his position, and Patrick touched everyone. He knew that everyone was relying on him.”

Brady had married his longtime girlfriend Kara Yankay and moved to an apartment in Belle Harbor. Brady and Kara pulled an April Fool’s prank three years on their wedding day, telling friends and family they were invited to his birthday party but it was really their wedding reception.

One of the people that Dew interviewed was William Maloney, now a teacher at Xavier who had met Brady on their first day of school at Xavier and developed a fast friendship that lasted a lifetime. “We played freshman football and he convinced me to join the rugby team,” recalled Maloney who now coaches the freshman football team.

“Pat was a true man for others; he didn’t allow people to hang out on the fringe,” Maloney told Dew. “He wanted everyone together and feeling like they were part of something bigger. He was loved by all the social groups—the jocks, the academics, the artists, the band guys, the JROTC lads, the 2:40 club, the JUG boys,” Maloney said.

Maloney complimented the young student journalist who worked on the story of his friend’s life. ”Hudson did an incredible story. He did all of his due diligence, tracked down multiple teachers and friends,” recalled Maloney. “I was very impressed with the beautiful story he wrote.”

Dew is heading to Cornell next year to major in industrial labor relations. He acknowledged this story was one of the toughest but most rewarding stories of his young journalism career.

Said Dew: “It was challenging but inspiring at the same time.”