The New York City Fire Department (FDNY) embarrassed itself by rejecting the application of a decorated U.S. Navy SEAL simply for being just six months and 25 days over the age limit for military veterans, according to Fox News.
37-year-old Shaun Donovan served four tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan after becoming a Navy SEAL in 2005. With his military career coming to a close in 2020, he hoped to serve as a firefighter in one of the most elite departments in the United States, which lost 343 of its own on September 11, 2001. That did not go as planned.
“Donovan scored in the top 1 percent on the latest FDNY entry exam and passed the physical fitness test. But when the application period started, he was just over age 35 — the maximum age for those who served in the military to enter the FDNY,” reports Fox News.
The FDNY is notorious for having some of the strictest age rules in the country, with 28 being the max if the applicant has no previous military experience. The department with the second-lowest age cap is Boston at 32, followed closely by Houston and Chicago respectively at 36 and 37. Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and Miami have no age cap. – READ MORE