Photo by PGFD’s Mark E. Brady.
FF Johnston is back in the hospital. Click here for an update.
More information on Riverdale VFD (PGFD Station 807) website
(Please note the time between pictures listed with the fire images at the bottom of this page were originally calculated using bad data. That has been corrected.)
The helmet of Firefighter Anthony Blazek is charred black as is much of the rest of his PPE. Firefighter Blazek, a three-year volunteer at Prince George’s County Fire & EMS Department Station 807, is in serious condition at the MedStar Burn Unit of the Washington Hospital Center with second and third degree burns on his face, neck and back. PGFD Chief Spokesman Mark Brady tells STATter 911 Blazek’s facepiece remained in place and there are no indications of respiratory burns.
At 11:30 this morning, Blazek responded aboard Truck 807 to a house fire at 6318 57th Avenue in Riverdale Heights. An engine from Station 813 (Riverdale Heights) arrived first and found light smoke showing from a one-story, single-family vacant house.
According to Brady, there appeared to be a small fire in the living room area as the crew from Station 813 advanced a hose line and donned gear. Truck 807 arrived at about the same time. According to a press release from Brady:
The crew from Truck 807 donned their PPE and SCBA and entered the structure to begin ventilation by removing windows. As the engine crew from Riverdale Heights prepared to enter the structure and extinguish the fire their hoseline sustained damage from glass or debris and broke; rendering it useless. As additional arriving firefighters stretched another hoseline into position a flashover occurred.
The crew from Truck 807, already in the house, made a quick retreat with some needing assistance from other firefighters. Firefighter Blazek was the most seriously injured, but Brady says Blazek does not appear to have life threatening injuries.
Twenty-three-year-old Cory Johnston, a 6-year volunteer at Station 807, was treated and released for minor burns.
The fire was quickly extinguished after the flashover. Investigators are blaming the fire on vagrants discarding smoking material in a couch. Damage is estimated at $25,000.
Firefighters don PPE and SCBA with light smoke visible in this first of four pictures shot by Probationary Volunteer Tony George of PGFD Station 813 (Riverdale Heights).
Six seconds later a small amount of fire and darker smoke can be seen at the sliding glass door. (Note: These are corrected times than the ones we originally used that were distributed by PGFD.)
Forty-eight seconds after the initial picture, more fire and darker smoke are apparent.
Exactly two-minutes after the first picture was shot, flashover occurs with firefighters inside.
Firefighter Tony Blazek’s Nomex hood in photo by PGFD’s Mark E. Brady.
The rest of FF Blazek’s PPE.
Comments
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Two minutes is much more believable and these picture are still excellent to show rapid fire buildup and progression.
Also note that in the first picture there is a good chance the FF blocks the view of possible visible flames. Glad to see proper gear was fully worn. My wishes for a speedy recovery.
Also, I wouldn't mind hearing more about the burst hoseline. I've seen a lot of causes of no water, but a fully burst hoseline I've found to be rare on an initial exterior line.
Who was responsible to ventilate, the windows????/
Truck 7 (Riverdale) was responsible for ventilation and should have immediately opened up the roof as well as windows and they did not. All of this goes without saying, especially by the 2 minute mark after arriving on scene. This is a prime example of why truck drivers need to be fireman first and drivers last. It's not just about getting a piece out anymore. Prayers go out to the injured fireman
Truck 7's driver was venting the house. He was also placing ladders to three sides of the house. One of the windows in the front of the house was vented before the crews made entry. Even if the driver placed a ladder and went to the roof to cut it before doing anything else it would not have been vented before the 2 minute mark.
This is a prime example of UNCOORDINATED ventilation. Instead of going through a house like a bull in a china shop smashing windows at random, truck company firefighters need to have an awareness of how ventilation effects fire growth & spread.
Had there been a charged handline to extinguish the fire as ventilation occured, we wouldn't be having this discussion.
It is sad that brother firefighters were injured – but they were injured because THEY MADE AN ERROR. We owe it to them and everyone else to POINT OUT an CORRET these errors and stop acting like this stuff "just happens".
You are correct, this accident occured solely because of Truck 7's error in doing their job as a truck. There are more people on the truck than just the driver and there is no reason to leave him by himself outside to vent windows, vent the roof, control utilities, and run lights. But as always, this truck company is all about freelancing and catching fire.
It doesn't take 2 minutes to search a 8 x 6 fire room either. The crew sat in the room trying to burn their gear up and look "salty". If you wanna just sit in the fire room and not do your job, ride the wagon.
I also beg to differ that you can't vent a roof in less than 2 minutes. Maybe that's a standard that Riverdale operates by. Might be a good idea for Truck 7 to try and drill on doing efficient and quick truck work. Or maybe they could stick to Engine Co. ops
First of all, thoughts and prayers to the injured for a quick recovery. I certainly don't claim to know all the facts – and somehow I doubt anyone here does.
I think there are lessons to be learnt here – like tactical venitlation, fire behavior etc.
That said to assume that someone is just hanging out in a room to burn up gear does a great injustice to PGFD.
why in gods name are you bashing each other and speculating on what the brothers inside were doing-how dare you. our brother is in bad shape and thats all that should be dicussed. we must learn from this unforunate incident and move on. unless there is a line in place nobody should be going around taking windows-if there was a burst line their should have been a urgent meesage to back out. lets keep our heads on straight brothers
First, prayers be with the injured and a wish for a speedy recovery.
I would refer all of you to the NIST website http://WWW.NIST.GOV they have done lots of research and testing with flashover conditions. The lack of heavy visable smoke is more due to the windows and insulation in the structure than the heat conditions inside. The fire development is consistant with an oxyigen limited condition. The time line also supports that. The first in crew should have reccognized those conditions and cooled the overhead which may have prevented the flashover from occurring. NIST also offers a program on fire dynamics for fire fighters which is well worth taking.
My thoughts and prayers go out to the injured men. I started my career only doing vertical ventilation.It is effective, but slow and dangerous. I am now a believer in PPV. It works. It is fast and easy to set up with very little chance of mistakes. We have to start thinking about sending our brothers into explosive atmospheres without aggressivly dealing with the smoke.
My thoughts and prayers go out to the Riverdale VFD family and FF's Blazek and Johnston. I hope they both make a very quick and speedy recovery.
I also hope that we can take what happend here and use it to better train ourselves to handle situations like this in the future before they occur.
I agree with the above comment. NONE of us should be bashing the guys that got caught in there. I can almost GUARANTEE that they got off the truck and did the BEST they could do given the situation. As ANY of us would. Hindsight is 20/20 and there are arguments on BOTH sides for venting prior to entry, what we need to concentrate on is that TWO OF OUR BROTHERS GOT HURT IN A BAD WAY. Yes we can always take something away from it but we should support our brothers as our own. They're you and me and it could happen today to any one of us. Lets not forget that. Be safe.
Also,
In reference to "dealing with smoke" have you guys looked into Paul grimwoods "CFBT" or "3-d Firefighting"?
Where is the water from the burst hose? Even as the plug man on a comp hydrant I cant shut the water down that fast!
First of all, all this was done and yall need to check yourselves. If you werent on the fire then you didnt know what happened so dont go and talk about it. If you have an issue witht anyone then make your own thread or something this isnt the page for it. get well soon brother and stay strong
Because someone ended up in the hospital, obviously correctable mistakes were made in this fire.
However, to lay the blame all on the truck co, I believe is incorrect. As an Eng Co Capt, I would have to lay blame first on the Eng Co for lack of water. Anytime you go into a fire without water, bad things can possibly happen.
Truck co men go in with the expectation that the engine co will control the fire. When that is not going to happen, such as when there is a water problem, that needs to go out over the radio immediately, and crews need to change tactics until there is adequate water.
That being said, ventilation needs to be coordinated with the water as others have said. From the pictures it appears that the fire started in the rear room shown with the sliding glass doors. If that was the case then probably those doors should have been vented first, but not until a line is charged and in place to control fire coming out under the porch roof. If there was limited fire in the front, venting a front window first would have probably been a mistake.
The person that said "The crew sat in the room trying to burn their gear up and look "salty"." probably has little real fire experience to make such a inappropriate comment. However, truck men do need to make sure a charged hoseline is in place before entering a room with visible fire. Real fires aren't like the training academy where you crawl around with fires raging.
Finally, as I hinted above, until I see a picture, or read a first hand account of the burst hoseline, my bet is that there was a different cause for the lack of water.
First I want to send best wishes for a speedy recovery to those injured. I also plan to take lessons from this incident. Looks like a water can would have done quick work if used at arrival. A short burst of water from the hose on the exterior while crews were still getting dressed would most likely also knocked it down and able to enter & finish it up.(getting dressed except for SCBA mask before arrival will speed things up) Truck crew needs to slow down and wait for the engine to be ready.
THINK SAFETY ALL THE TIME
EVERYONE GOES HOME
Thanks for the pics and ability for me to learn.
If you read the Riverdale http://www.riverdalevfd.org web site they said initially that they were unsure what led to the tragic events of this particular house fire. Burst line, Windows taken out, flash over, accelerants… Set fire in a possible forclosed house. There are A LOT of variables that contributed to this fire.
And to the guy who said to open the roof. Minutes 0-1.5 did not indicate that the roof needed to be opened. By minute 2, it was too late.
Get well Tony and Cory. And Becareful everyone!
I'm sure there is a serious investitagion going on. Tony received burns to his entire upper body as he was engulfed in flames. I find it hard to believe that he "was trying to salt up his gear" in a chump contents fire of a vacant/nearly vacant house.
Things went bad real fast. Look for that video from Northern VA from a year or so back. Heavy fire on arrival (not typical) but then things went to hell reall fast.
May our injured brothers heal fully and quickly.
From a training stand point
A back up line and crew should be in place prior to entry
Enter from the exterior unburned side
Loss of water pressure dictates evacuation to safe location
One ladder to the roof, initially, for a single story structure
Mandatory drill for emergency evacuation
PPV, if done properly, in place behind entry crew, works well to protect crew from flames and smoke/heat
Questions
what was the layout of the entry way?
could they have made different entry point?
As we were not there and we are not mind readers, we must learn from this situation to avoid another tragic situation,
take care,
wags
THERE IS SOME SERIOUS IMMATURE NAME CALLING-FINGER POINTING GOING ON IN THIS BLOG. WHILE THERE MAY BE SOME BAD BLOOD BETWEEN THE COMPANIES OPERATING AT THIS FIRE,NO TRUCK COMPANY CAN FORSEE A LINE BURSTING. IF CONDITIONS WERE TOLERABLE, THEN THE TRUCK COMPANY OPERATING INSIDE SEARCHING WERE PERFORMING THIER TASK. IF THE ENGINE HAD WATER, THEN VENTING BEFORE ENTRY MADE GOOD SENSE. WAS THE OIC IN THE PROCESS OF ORDERING THE MEN OUT OF THE BUILDING WHEN THE FLASHOVER OCCURED ???
For those interested this was Dave's post concerning the actual picture times he posted on another site:
According to the data, the first picture is taken at 1:28:05 (I had already been told the clock had not been set properly).
The second one occurred at 1:28:11, :06 after the first picture.
The third one occurred at 1:28:53, :48 after the first picture.
The fourth one was taken at 1:30:05, 2:00 after the first picture.
Dave,
Any chance to see if you can post more pics? This incident seems to be generating interest and people I'm sure would like to see more such as the front of the house and any more taken with the initial series. Thanks
I like wags comment to enter from the unburned side. A good basic tactic that along with coordinated ventilation would have worked well. However, I disagree with the need to wait for a backup line or else you end up with the results seen in the picture while waiting for two lines. Early water is important, but I suspect there was more initial fire than seen in the picture, so I also question the water can suggestion.
Wow, this is a tragic story. I am a firefighter and I am thankful for the learning experience that this blog puts out there. Everybody always shows up gung-ho to fight fire and this has shown me to stop and think first about the hazards. Even though a ruptured handline cannot be predicted, we should never be in a building without backup crew. Luckily, these 2 firefighters are alive and alot of us can learn from their mistakes. Thanks guys
I'm sure this was addressed before, but I didn't have the time to read all of the comments. The only question I have is why did they have to enter the structure to break the windows? The windows appear to be ground level and accessible.
Lets not bash each other this is a tragety, lets learn from this and help each other, we are our own worst enemies. My thoughts and prays
It always amazes me. My husband is the fire chief of a small volunteer fire department. He never lets his guys do an interior attack,especially when the house is empty. Where are these fire chiefs st. They aren't training these fireman the appropriate safety measures. What about the old saying a good firefighter isn't a dead firefighter. Time to really rethink how we train our loved ones
This is PG County and a vacant house is a term used losely. A vacant house means no one lives there who should live there. It does not mean that squatters are not inside or children aren't playing around inside. If you look at the pictures, the house clearly does not look vacant from the exterior at all.
While you're husband's small town might have vacants that everyone in the town knows is vacant, we cannot take that for granted. We also have far too many residences here in PG County, MD to know every vacant house in the area.
This is also an aggressive interior firefighting department in most Battalions. Most try to do their job, do it right, and go home safely.