West Webster Firefighters Joseph Hofstetter and Ted Scardino told their survival stories for the first time Wednesday.

"I arrived first in my personal vehicle, saw that it was just the car burning, it wasn't to the house yet, pulled past it a few doors down, got dressed in my fire gear," said Hofstetter.

Hofstetter has been with the West Webster Fire Department 14 years. He says he lives on Lake Road, a reason why he was first on the scene Christmas Eve.

"There was a neighbor out front who I asked if the house that was immediately adjacent to the car was occupied. The house wasn't burning yet but it was in danger of catching fire."

Hofstetter says moments after that, his colleagues pulled up in a fire truck. Once he joined them to grab additional gear, gunshots rang out.

"I originally thought it was the car burning. The noises were very similar. It wasn't until I went around to the other side of the truck when I realized we were being shot at and I turned and I was struck," he said. "I fell to the ground, crawled back to the other side immediately, sat on the ground for a second and then realized I need to get to that radio and to warn everybody and also get the help that I knew I needed."

Hofstetter says it was adrenaline kicking in that kept him calm during that radio call:

"We are being shot at. Multiple firemen down. Multiple firemen shot. I am shot. I think he's using an assault rifle. We have multiple fireman down. Working fire."

The call stopped dozens of first responders heading to the scene.

"I knew a lot of people were coming behind us. We were the first ones there. You definitely don't want any more people to walk into that booby trap that we walked into," he said.

Hofstetter suffered a gunshot wound to his pelvis. After a failed attempt to drive the fire truck to escape the scene, he made his way to his car.

"After that it was just survival, doing you best to get out of there," he said.

Hofstetter managed to drive past a police checkpoint, where help was waiting.

"I wanted to survive for myself but my family as well."

Hofstetter says he's now focused on recovery. He says the community support is overwhelming.

"I know one thing that's meant a lot to me is I've had people come through my door at the hospital, they were either shooting victims themselves or involved in similar situations," said Hofstetter.

He has physical therapy twice a week. Still, he knows getting back to work will take months.

"I just remind myself that it's a long process and to just keep working hard. Hopefully, the day will come, sooner than later."

"Fear," said Ted Scardino. "It was just unbelievable fear."

An hour and a half. That's how long Scardino waited. With a bullet in his back and his leg, hiding underneath a fire truck, he knew time was not on his side.

"It was eternity."

Scardino arrived at 191 Lake Road in Engine 125 with with his friend and colleague, Lt. Michael Chiapperini. It was 5:42 a.m., the morning of Christmas Eve. The pair was expecting a car fire..

"I jumped out of the truck and within five seconds there were several pops."

They were greeted with something much more dangerous.

"Chip recognized it as gunfire, and said we're getting shot at, and those were the last words I heard him say."

Chiapperini was hit and mortally wounded.

While running for cover, Scardino was shot twice. One of the bullets passed through his lung. In full gear and unable to use his left arm or right leg, Ted crawled underneath the truck.

"I said to myself, I can survive if the police are here in five minutes and this was all over, so I'm going to just play dead for a couple of minutes."

In an attempt to escape and not knowing Scardino was hiding underneath, fellow firefighter Joe Hofstetter tried to drive the truck away from the scene. The gun shots had stopped but Scardino wasn't out of danger.

"He could have been still roaming and I was a sitting duck for him to take some more shots at if he were around."

With that one word ringing in his head.

"Survival."

Scardino laid in the middle of the road and pretended to be dead until emergency crews arrived. They did.

While he knows he'll never forget what happened that night, he's focusing on his recovery.

"My arm has pretty good range of motion back. The hand is the weakest link right now and its starting to come back. I'm starting to get feeling in it."

Despite everything he lost that night, Scardino says he's gained something back in the weeks and months following this nightmare: support from the same community he risked his life for.

"Just complete strangers walking up to you at Wegmans and shaking your hand. You know, there's a lot of good people out there. Unfortunately, we have that one bad person, but there's a lot of good people out there."