Earlier quoted context omitted.
Our ability for pattern recognition w/ human faces developed over the course of many thousands of years. People in modern fire fighting gear weren't present through that process. A kid thinking a firefighter is a robot is not the same class of problem. Even kids are good at the type of tasks we're talking about.
People have difficulty distinguishing the individual faces of other races. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-race_effect So at some level it breaks down for us too.
Yes and I think its fair to say that a firefighter in full gear is a reasonable place for it to breakdown, and that does does not otherwise indicate a failing in human capability in this area that should make our failure modes in any way whatsoever at the same level or rate as computer models.