Fire while getting a haircut

My company was at a wetdown in another town, but I stayed back since I had a mother's day dinner that night. While under the apron getting a haircut, my pager went off for a house fire on Union Street. I jumped up, threw a 20 on the table and ran out. Another engine was already flying down the hill, they were apparently all in the firehouse waiting for their turn to go to the wetdown so they got out fast.

I ran to the firehouse, grabbed my gear and jumped in a buddy's car. As we got on scene, we saw light smoke coming from the attic window of the house. We ran to another engine and grabbed some Scott Pack's and tools. As we entered the house, there were already about 5 or 6 guys at the top of the stairs. We helped hump a charged line around the winding staircases to the 3rd floor. After that, we investigated the other rooms but so no fire or smoke. It started getting very crowded up there with other firefighters, so the Safety officer made his way up and kicked most of us out.

When I walked out of the front door and looked up, the light haze had turned to thick black smoke that was pushing out of the attic window - not a good thing. I went with a few others to the basement and first floors to investigate to make sure the fire hadn't started in the basement - something that has happened before, especially in Balloon Frame Construction. We poked a few holes and found nothing, then made our way back up to the 3rd floor.


The attack team was rotated out and we missed our chance to replace them as another team went up when we were in the basement. Walking around on the floor below the fire floor, the ceilings were gushing with water. I was afraid that the water weight combined with whatever fire-load was in the attic, plus the firemen, would be too much for the ceiling to hold, so my team and I began extensively taking down the sheetrock on the ceiling to let the water drain. Hundreds of gallons of water quickly flowed from hundreds of holes in the ceiling, covering all of us in char, soot and muck. After that, we heard on the radio the fire was finally knocked down and we just turned over the overhaul operations to a neighboring town's crew.

Auto Yard Haz-Mat / Trailer Fire

It was about 3:40 AM on a work night when dispatch said there was a trash fire behind Shop Rite. I almost rolled over on the call, but I'm currently running for Lieutenant so I figured it'd be good to show my face for a B.S. call so close to the time I'd have to wake for work. Sleep's overrated anyway right?

Anyway, as I'm driving down, dispatch came through and changed the story 3 times, finally saying it was a trailer fire in the local Junk Yard. No drivers showed for our engine so we jumped on the ladder truck and pulled into the lot to see a huge plume of dark smoke above a heavy fire load at the base of a building. The main problem was a huge metal gate w/ a chain and padlock. We tried jamming a halligan through the padlock and beating on that with the flathead axe, but I got fed up and got the circular saw and cut through the chain in a matter of seconds.

My crew and I ran forward and the truck followed us, sneaking past the fire to get better positioning to put the ladder up behind the building. We stretched lines off the ladder truck as no engines had arrived yet, and just as we're about to throw it into pump, the Chief yelled to us to forget the line and to put the ladder up, as the fire was now climbing the side of the building. I saw how close we were to putting a fire-attack team into play so I ran and argued with the Truck chauffeur until he quickly threw the ladder into pump before going back to the ladder operations.


I oversaw two of our guys as they alternated keeping a 50 gallon metal drum of god-knows-what cool and attacking the actual fire on the building and rooftop. When they had it under control, I ran and grabbed 2 other guys and some tools and began working on the door to gain entry into the building. As I'm putzing around getting a halligan, one of my guys gave a swift mule kick to the door and it flew open. Not too smart if there was built up pressure and heat behind that door, but he swears to me that he checked it first.

We masked up and went in, surprised the visibility was great and there was only a light haze of smoke, and no visible fire. I was pulling a chain to open the huge garage door to vent when a captain from another company came over and started screaming "NO DON'T SHUT IT, OPEN IT." He was obviously confused on which way I was pulling the chain, and I yelled back for him to "calm the fuck down." ...Let's just say he didn't like that very much. He began yelling "what do you mean calm down? I AM CALM!!!!" Whatever. It was a misunderstanding and we both apologized to eachother later and it was squashed.

It was a smooth fire, we got outta there around 7 AM, I ran home, showered and went to work.

Creepy graveyard fire

We trained at the fire academy for hours doing RIT Training (read about it here) and got back into Lodi about 11:30 PM - exhausted. I fell asleep when the pager went off about 1 AM for a "Fire in St. Nick's Cemetary." I thought to myself "what the hell is there to burn in a cemetary" as I walked out of my house and immediately smelt smoke.

As we're driving on the engine to the cemetary we can see the smoke plume and thought a building was on fire, but pulling in gave us a clear view to about 15 or 20 separate brush fires all throughout the cemetary. It looked like a scene from a movie where people are holdling a seance in a graveyard with rings of fire. As I'm pulling our hoseline off the reels on the side of the engine, I was laughing with our chauffer about how creepy this all was.

Anyway, laughter turned to labor as we stretched and charged all 250 feet of our attack line (inch and 3/4 diameter) and began putting out the fires. They were spaced out enough that after hitting one fire, we had to lift and move the entire length of charged hoseline over and around tombstones and corners to reach the next fire. We did this about 5 times in total until the reach of the stream was far enough to hit the last, and furthest fire. Let's just say my shoulders got a good workout this night.

My guess is some punk was walking around with a box of matches and just went to town, since we saw a lot of tombstones knocked over as well (along side the few that our hoseline happened to shift or push.)

Pinto Garbage Truck Fire

We're moving apartments, and I was exhausted and fell asleep around 9:30 PM. When the call came through, dispatch said a caller reported a "fire inside the complex of Pinto's on Route 46." I woke up and was in a daze, confused on which apartment I was even in. At the firehouse, only 4 of us showed up in total.

We came down Rt. 46 and I didn't see smoke or anything yet. AJ called back to us from the front officer's seat and told Brian to get the hydrant, wrapping both of our rear 3 inch lines around the hydrant as we slowly rolled forward. I jumped out and pulled both line's off our rear reels so he'd have enough length. I went to grab tools when AJ said "forget the tools, we'll work off their truck, lets just go."

When we got close enough, I saw it was a garbage truck fully involved, and the Chief ran up screaming for us to hurry and get up there. Once again, I hate when people get hyper at car-fires if there's no exposures to concern us. The truck is already a loss, why should we run in 15 degree weather when there's black ice everywhere just to gain 10 seconds on a fire that's already totalled the truck or car.

Anyway, the safety officer yelled at 2 guys from Engine 614 to mask-up, so I dropped to a knee, masked up and walked over to back up the former Lieutenant of another company on his 1 3/4 inch line. Fire was ripping through the front cab of the truck, but after a few seconds of straight-stream, the fire quickly darkened down. We hit it again in the wheel wells before walking around to the front to see if it was completely out. It was, for the most part, so we continued just hitting hot spots before quickly putting up a ladder to view down into the truck for any other extension.

Going back to pack up at the engine, I learned that Brian didn't wrap one of the 3-inch lines tight enough around the hydrant and as the engine drove forward, the line got loose and was pulled down the street. Left with just one line, he hooked it to the hydrant but opened the hydrant too early when a Chief called for water, when he should have waited for his Driver/Pumper to call for water instead. The water flow caught the driver off guard but he got it under control in time.

Things like stretching lines, wrapping hydrants, and pulling hose off our reels are the essential things at every fire, but it seems our guys have gotten so cocky with their knowledge of our engine that they don't want to drill on those things anymore. Then we get stupid little mistakes like these that could really cause havoc if it had been a structure fire instead of a truck fire.

Screaming at a car fire

As I'm driving down Rt. 46 to Home Depot we get paged out to a car fire on Kipp Ave. We're busy Scotting up when we pull up behind the house where the car is. The car happens to be next to a white fence in someone's back yard. I hear screaming on the radio really loud as the Captain of another engine company is yelling "I NEEEED WATER NOWWW." It so happens their engine was nearly out of water when they pulled up but instead of waiting, they still stretched a line and tried to do what they could.

It still amazes me at how excited even some of these seasoned men can get at a car fire. Unless a car is against a building or other exposure, and unless there's someone trapped inside, there is NEVER a time for excitement in a car fire. By the time we get there and start putting water on it, it will always be past the point of being totalled anyway. There is no saving a car in a fire and no point to get people hurt trying.

Hearing a Captain screaming at the top of his lungs like that, seeing the panic in his face, and watching him yell at someone later to get a saw to cut the hood is disheartening to see. We're supposed to look at these older guys for guidance and to keep us new guys calm, not to get us ralled up for no reason.

...and to think, this guy wants to run for chief next year...

Mutual Aid - Woodridge House Fire

Saturday night I went snowboarding, got home late and fell asleep around 1 AM. About 5 Am, dispatch requested our engine to Woodridge to stand by at their firehouse for a working house fire. As I'm running down the stairs without my car keys, I stop short and run back up to grab them when dispatch states Woodridge now wants us to the scene to go to work.

Running into headquarters, 3 guys were there ahead of me so the Chief told them to go ahead in the Rescue Truck since Woodridge "needed" manpower asap, so I waited a few more minutes for a couple of guys, then we started off.

When we got to the scene, we staged around the block but it was still dark out and I could see flames blowing out a window and a plume of smoke. I helped the Chief gear up and we walked to the scene with our SCBA, axes and halligans and flashlights.

We were told to stand by as a F.A.S.T. Team, and we basically watched them fight the fire for an hour. Woodridge has 60 minute air bottles, and they must have did a solid interior attack for 3/4 of that limited time, I was impressed. I know how exhausting it is and 45 minutes of solid firefighting is enough to knock anyone on his / her ass.

Basically all we were useful for that night was to pack up their hose, which was rough since in the 9 degree weather, everything that had even gotten misted was now a sheet of ice. We helped pack up 5-inch line that, with the solid, frozen contents, probably weighed 200lbs per length. I've never seen inch 3/4 line freeze SOLID before, making rolling and folding impossible. The sub-pumps we were using to pump out the basement after a long fire attack were hosing down nearby trucks, people and EMS gurneys, turning them almost instantly into ice sculptures.

This reminds me of the fire on December 9, 2006 where my wet jacket froze solid and I had icy water in my boots after the water-main in the basement fire broke.

Car vs Pole - Car wins!!

Just walked in the door and the pager goes off (around 2:50 AM) for a "motor vehicle accident with entrapment." I didn't even notice the address given, which was right down the street from my house on First Street, nor did I hear the accident when it occurred. There were enough of us that responded to the firehouse that most of our guys went with the Rescue truck, yet me and 2 other guys rode with the Engine.

When we got there, the guy's car was on its side, a wooden utility pole was slightly tilted, and the Rescue-Jacks were already in place stabilizing the car from rolling or pitching. I stretched a hoseline off the Engine to the front of the car before a Chief brought my attention to the leaning utility pole right above my head. I then restretched the line in a safer direction and stayed there with one of our new guys.

Turns out the driver was very drunk, and comical. He wasn't hurt at all and was able to climb out the sunroof once two of our guys ripped it off. Then he said "I hope no one else was hurt," to which we said "Sir, you were the only one in the car" to which he replied "I was???" Also, while sitting in the ambulance he made us promise to let him know when the ambulance got there. We got quite a kick out of that.

The odd part of the accident was that there was quite a bit of split wood sitting next to the wooden utility pole that he hit, yet the pole was pretty straight on the ground with no visible damage. The car ended up taking a 3 foot section right off the bottom of the pole, and the pole simply dropped down 3 ft into its original hole. Pretty cool once I realized what I was looking at.

Second view of the John Street Fire

While knocking on doors for a fundraiser yesterday, I approached the house that had the May 2007 fire on John Street. The owner seemed very grateful for the good job we did and invited me in to take a look. It took a while for me to get my bearings once in the basement, first because we entered from the rear and he took me this time through the front, and secondly because everything just looks a lot different in broad daylight as compared to a smoke filled hotbox.

He showed me that the fire started behind a boiler that was having problems, and I saw where it worked up the wall and up to the spot where the fireball blew out at me and my current lieutenant. The guy was grateful but said his father was angry that we, the firemen, tore up the walls and broke windows. Civilians sometimes don't understand that 95% of the damage we do is for investigation or fire-stop purposes, or to improve the inferno-like conditions a house can take during a fire for our crews.

Broken windows is our main source of ventilation, which means less heat, more oxygen and better visibility for the guys inside, and these are vital. Taking down walls is an attempt to find hidden fire, or paths the fire might be taking as it travels through the walls and floors of a dwelling. The guy seemed to understand this all but reminded me of how sometimes our actions are misunderstood and house owners think firemen are just bulls in china shops. We made a great, quick stop that day ONLY because we opened up the walls and ceiling and found the fire before it took over completely.

DUI Rollover on Rt. 17

I decided to stay in Saturday night and hang out, and about 2 AM we got a call for a rollover with entrapment in the parking lot of Home Depot and National Wholesale Liquidators, which borders Route 17. I raced to the firehouse and while I was getting geared up I heard them mention on the radio that the victim was out safely.

The truck veered off the highway at a reasonably high speed, slammed into raised train tracks, hit its nose into a ditch and ended up flipping and sliding. All the contents of the truck were smushed out the back and the roof was smashed in everywhere except the drivers cabin. The guy's lucky to be alive.

Burn victim dies

The burn victim I spoke about in the last post, I just found out, has died. I hear the shock, coupled with infections had weakened his heart and it finally gave out about 2 weeks after the incident. I thought we did a great job and got him out quick, but apparently it wasn't enough...