FDNY members among dead in military helicopter crash in Iraq

Two FDNY members were among the seven US soldiers killed in a helicopter crashThursday in Iraq, department sources told The Post.

Fire marshal Christopher “Tripp” Zanetis and Lt. Christopher Raguso were aboard the Pave Hawk military chopper that went down after hitting a power line Thursday near al-Qaim, a town in western Iraq near the Syrian border, sources said.

Zanetis’s overwhelmed father confirmed the death Friday when reached by The Post.

“It’s a great loss to everybody,” said John Zanetis. “He cared for people. He loved people. He loved the service.”

Zanetis, 37, was on unpaid leave from the FDNY as he pursued a career in law. Raguso was on military leave, department sources said.

Zanetis obtained his law degree from Stanford University, and had recently begun working with a Manhattan-based law firm, his father said.

“He was a very stand-up, moral, ethical person, up one side and down the other,” the grief-stricken father said. “He just wanted to be of service. He served people in the fire department, and in the military, and was going to do the same thing as a lawyer.”

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