This is video from Matt Gregoire (sparkywfd) of Providence Fire Videos from a fire yesterday on Pond House Road in North Smithfield, Rhode Island. Here’s some of Matt’s description of the fire:
On arrival of the FD, heavy fire was showing from the rear of the house. Chief Jillson quickly ordered mutual aid tankers to the scene because there are no hydrants in the area.
Firefighters couldn’t make entry on side 2 because of an electrical line burning but as they attempted to make entry on side 3, they encountered a dog inside, grabbed him and brought him to safety.
With the fire rapidly progressing, firefighters were forced to exit the building and fight the fire from the exterior.
The fire started around 4:30 a.m. inside St. Michael’s Ukrainian Orthodox Parish on Harris Avenue.
Captain Michael Morin of the Woonsocket Fire Department said he believes the cause of the fire stemmed from a service held Tuesday night.
“They had a service the night before, they were using incense, and it was a product of charcoal, I believe incense they used wasn’t properly disposed of after.”
The fire caused major damage to the room where it started, a service room at the extreme end of the church that’s used by altar boys to prepare for services. It also caused serious damage to the church’s slate roof. There was major water and smoke damage to the entire church.
A chandelier in the middle of the church crashed down to the floor. The stone building’s slate roof made it difficult for firefighters to cut holes in the roof to vent the fire and get at the blaze, according to Capt. Michael Morin, a fire marshal for the Woonsocket Fire Department.
It has been a while since we’ve run a video from Matt Gregoire at Providence Fire Videos. This is one of Matt’s from the night of October 12 on Mohawk St in the Lake Hiawatha section of Bellingham, Massachusetts.
ProvidenceFireVideos.com‘s Matt Gregoire, as usual, captures the action at a four-alarm house fire yesterday in Uxbridge, Massachusetts. You will hear a bit of yelling at :48 on the video as two firefighters on the tip of the ladder suddenly find themselves a little close to the action. Matt labeled it a close call. The fire on Kasey Court was reported around 7:30 PM and was in an area with no hydrants.
Matthew Gregoire of ProvidenceFireVideos.com and Corey Welch of CoreyWelchVideo.com both braved the single digit temperatures for this morning’s three-alarm fire in a multi-family home in Central Falls, Rhode Island. The fire left five families homeless. Matt’s video is above and Corey’s below.
Here is some of what Matt wrote in his description on YouTube.com:
Shortly after 1:30 am on Friday March 4, 2011, calls came into the fire alarm office reporting a house fire on Hedley Ave. While companies were already tied up at a small fire a few blocks away, they released 1 company and they arrived to find the rear porch fully involved extending inside in this occupied multi family.
Matt Gregoire has been busy. Besides the garage fire yesterday in Burrillville, Rhode Island that we ran earlier on Quick Takes (click here and scroll down), he was up at 3:00 this morning for a chimney fire on Buxton Street in North Smithfield. In the video you will hear a crew on the second floor trying to get someone to remove windows. Later, the air horns sound.
House fire in Wheeling, Illinois: Firegeezer.com has the Larry Shapiro pictures and details to go with the video above from what started out as a dryer fire Saturday morning.
Can we laugh at ourselves?: The topic is the first two webisodes of the series Hosed on YouTube (webisode 1 here and webisode 2 here). Did you laugh at Reno 911? For the Firegeezer crowd, how about Car 54 Where are You? Do you believe that Rescue Me makes the public think all New York firefighters are drug addicts, sex addicts, philanderers and wife beaters? The large majority of people who commented so far on STATter911.com about comedian Juston McKinney’s Hosed think it is just a funny series of shorts about a fictional volunteer fire department in New Hampshire. And like all good satire, it has some characters many of us can identify with. Others see it is something more sinister. That Dave Statter is running it because he is anti-volunteer. Does anyone out there honestly think I wouldn’t post them if this was about a fictional career fire department? Some who have written comments to STATter911.com and Firefighter Nation’s Facebook page believe Hosed does nothing but make volunteers look bad. Should volunteer firefighters be off limits to comedians? Bill Carey at Backstep Firefighter put together some of those comments and provides his own unique response.
Raw video from mayday in Southern Maryland: In Calvert County there was a mayday during a house fire on Saturday in Lusby. Raw video shows a firefighter being carried from the building. There is a lot of video to look at with this clip. Click here.
Schultz versus Beck on firefighter pensions: The MSNBC host (with help from the IAFF) takes on the Fox News host and his views about firefighter pensions. Click here to see videos from both sides.
Is a 1997 fire leaving a deadly legacy?: That’s the question being asked in Hamilton, Ontario following the deaths and serious illness of firefighters who were on the Plastimet fire 14-years-ago. TheSpec.com reports the four day industrial blaze had such high levels of hydrochloric acid that metal on fire trucks melted. Check out the story.
Connecticut’s OSHA cites Bridgeport in firefighter deaths: Click here to read what CONN-OSHA listed as violations following its investigation into the deaths last year of Lt. Steven Velasquez and Firefighter Michael Baik. The department is fighting the charges. You will also see that Dave takes a little swipe at the news media coverage of this story.
He does more than make us laugh & stir trouble … he even shows up at a fire every so often: Will Wyatt recently had to go underground after exposing the world to TIMIS in his FireRescue1.com column (click here for the column and the comments). Rather than to organize a telethon to wipe out this awful syndrome, Will just went into hiding. But he surfaced last week at his real job and snapped the picture to the right of a two-alarm apartment fire in Harris County, Texas. If you want to read about the fire and see some video, click here. By the way, Tiger Schmittendorf is the latest to discover that Will’s book And a Paycheck, Too! is quite funny (click here to buy it). Tiger plans to have Will on his Firefighter Storytellers netcast in April (check out Tiger’s other shows, including his recent interview with Fire Chief’s Janet Wilmoth).
Even checking fire hydrants isn’t safe: In Syracuse, New York, a firefighter making sure hydrants are clear of snow found himself threatened by a knife wielding man. Click here for the story.
Two-alarms in Baltimore County, Maryland: The picture at left is from Michael “firepix1075” Schwartzberg from a house fire yesterday in Chestnut Ridge. Click here for his video. Here’s what Michael wrote about the fire-
“Units reported smoke showing while responding, and when units from nearby Chestnut Ridge Volunteer Fire Company arrived they were met with heavy smoke in the rear of the house, where the fire possibly started on a porch. The fire extended into the attic and roof area and flames vented through the roof. Access to the house was extremely limited, making firefighting operations challenging. This area has no fire hydrants, so firefighters had to use a tanker shuttle, bringing water from a hydrant more than a mile away via fire department water tankers.”
Response time concerns in Minneapolis: The union, worried about budget and staffing cuts that have occurred, and possibly more on the way, says 11 minutes is too long for a ladder truck to show up on the scene of a house fire. That’s what happened Saturday on Beard Avenue South. The fire chief says he is looking into it. So is a TV station. Click here to read and watch the story.
Early arrival of photographer for Burrillville, Rhode Island explosion & fire: Matt Gregoire from has the first units on the scene as a garage fire extends to the attached home on Mt. Pleasant Road yesterday. The homeowner was seriously burned. The fire went to a second alarm. More at providencefirevideos.com.
Apartment fire in Spokane, Washington: This is from a fire yesterday at the Houston House Apartments in North Spokane. News reports confirm what the video shows that it started on the second floor and had spread to the roof by the time firefighters had knocked the fire in the original apartment and the one above. The fire went to three-alarms with no injuries reported. Click here for four more video clips.
Must see video: It’s a week late, but you should see this video of arcing & sparking lines on top of a beer truck with the driver still inside. More lines came down trapping an ambulance crew. Click here for the story from Cottonwood Heights, Utah.
The battle over ambulance fees in Montgomery County, Maryland: Hours away from Tuesday’s election, The Washington Post’s Michael Laris tries to sort out all of the charges and counter-charges in the divisive fight over whether Montgomery County can bill insurance companies for ambulance service. Here’s the story.
Pikesville, Maryland house fire: Michael Schwartzberg was on the scene at a fire in Baltimore County early Sunday morning that left one occupant burned. Watch the video.
Child & adult dead in collision with fire vehicle in Delaware: DelawareOnline.com reports the two deaths in Felton Sunday evening after a crash on Dupont Highway with a utility vehicle from the Harrington Fire Department. A Delaware State Police report says a 29-year-old man and an 11-year-old boy were killed when their vehicle used the median to pass an SUV driven by a Harrington FD member and then struck the SUV before hitting another vehicle heading in the opposite direction on the highway.
Fire building with a checkered past: In Kalamazoo, Michigan Saturday evening a fire destroyed part of the 88-year-old former Checker Motors complex. The fire has been called suspicious. Checker was famous for its distinctive taxis. Read more.
Mississippi house fire: Video from a fire Saturday in Kosciusko, Mississippi. Click here.
Professional wrestling and amateurish handling of the emergency: Dave recalls his youth watching wrestling matches at the Baltimore Civic Center as he looks at a four-year-old video of a fire during a televised wrestling event. Check it out.
Detroit sees increase in fires over Halloween weekend: Certainly far from the 800 fires on Devil’s Night in 1984, but the three day total was at 129, 10 more than last year. Read more.
EMS chief accused of being drunk at scene: An interesting story from Gloucester Township, NJ where the head of the EMS Alliance was arrested at a barricade scene. Here’s the story.
Update on close call with Boston’s Ladder 26 and power lines: Firefighter Close Calls has an updated and detailed account of the recent incident that caused an electrical shock to a Boston firefighter. You will want to read it.
The parrot in the house fire becomes the canary in the coal mine: No smoke alarms in a York, Pennsylvania home that caught fire early Thursday morning. But two people made it out thanks to their squawking pet parrot. Here’s more.
Behind the scenes during Backdraft filming: A look back 20-years to Ron Howard and company shooting in Chicago for Backdraft. Click here.
Turmoil at Texas fire company: The chief quit in disgust, an assistant chief stepped down and at least one other firefighter has left the Noonday VFD. The problem started when a repo man tried to snatch a firefighter’s vehicle. The claim is firefighters tried to prevent the repo man from doing his job. Read and watch the details.
Blockage in vent requires extrication: Martin Grube at Fire Rescue TV had an up close and personal view of an unusual extrication in the exhaust system of a Virginia Beach, Virginia restaurant. Click here for the video.
Garages on fire in Millville, Massachusetts: Matt Gregoire at Providence Fire Videos caught this one on Saturday afternoon.
Four-alarm fire in Fall River, Massachusetts: Providence Fire Videos on the scene yesterday afternoon at a vacant mill complex on Bay Street. Two firefighters were slightly hurt. Here’s more.
Jerry Engle on the left. James Martinez on the right.
Second PGFD volunteer pleads guilty in 2008 arson case: James Martinez, a 25-year-old former career firefighter in Montgomery County, Maryland, has entered a guilty plea on Monday to second-degree conspiracy to commit arson in connection with a fire that Martinez fought as a volunteer with the Riverdale VFD in Prince George’s County. This is the same fire that long-time PGFD volunteer Jerry Engle admitted to setting. Engle was sentenced in September to a year in jail, but was released on time served (click here for that story). Martinez is scheduled for sentencing on December 3. Ruben Castaneda has more in The Washington Post. Click here to review our previous coverage of this case beginning in April, 2009.
Suspended Spalding County, GA firefighter identified. Report calls for firing over cell phone video of dead woman: The report looking at the July incident where video was taken of the body of a woman inside a crushed car calls for at least one firefighter to be fired. At the same time the local news media has identified the firefighter who was suspended after the incident came to light as Terrence Reid. Here’s the latest.
VA fire chief charged with DWI: NVDaily.com reports that Tim Welsh, who heads Virginia’s Frederick County Fire & Rescue Department, is on administrative leave following his arrest Monday on a DWI charge. Here are the details (more here).
Did cops turn off the sprinkler system at California mall where man had barricaded himself?: As we first told you yesterday the answer to that question is now part of the official investigation into the blaze that heavily damaged the Westfield Galleria in Roseville. Click here to learn what a TV station has determined so far. Also, Fossilmedic Mike Ward, who had suspicisions about the sprinkler issue right away, wonders if this was done to keep the robots from melting. Check it out.
Chief resigns following rebellion by firefighters over winter uniform: In Chelsea, Massachusetts, where the IAFF local and Chief Herbert Fothergill have long battled, the final skirmish came when the chief wrote up almost the entire department for not wearing the winter uniform shirt. Then Chief Fothergill suddenly resigned. More from Boston.com.
Deputy sheriff’s great escape after lighting up: Pretty amazing story from Jackson County, Georgia where a sheriff’s deputy’s propane-powered cruiser caught fire after he lighted a cigarette while responding to a call. Here’s that story.
Refund may be coming for Tulsa firefighter applicants: Before charging $25 a head to 342 people who want to be firefighters the City of Tulsa claims it checked out a lot of the legalities. The one they forgot to look at is whether Tulsa had the authority to do it without a City Council approved ordinance being enacted. Read the details.
Firefighters honored for saving bridge from barge: In New Hope, Pennsylvania four firefighters have been recognized for helping to figure out how to keep a runaway barge from taking out a bridge on a rain swollen river. Here’s more.
As you can imagine there are lots of videos on YouTube from the large fire overnight in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. These are two of the nicer ones by people who know their way around a video camera. For both it is not their first rodeo or fire. In addition each was able to capture the significant collapses at the mill structure (Check out Firegeezer.com for details on the fire).
For those of you who take fire videos there’s a lot to learn from these. The one above is by Corey Welch who is obviously in the TV business. His website is here. You may notice that one reason Welch’s video is so clean and steady is that he uses a tripod. It can make a big difference. Even a monopod will help with making your videos more pleasant to view.
In both videos (the one below is by ProvidenceFireVidoes.com, which has a wealth of experience shooting fires) there is not a lot of pointless zooming, panning, tilting and wild camera movements. Each has nicely framed shots letting the action fill that frame. The videographers didn’t just turn the camera on and point. They have given thought to each shot. They took a variety of shots that helps the editing process.
There’s a lot more to know about shooting good video, but if you are someone who regularly shows up at fire scenes with camera in hand, you should study these two clips on how to improve your shooting.
Fire in Burrillville, RI: From Providence Fire Videos a fire in a vacant building on Victory Hwy in the Oakland Mapleville section around 1:30 PM.
Tragedy and joy at the same scene: Quite the drama at a railroad crossing in Des Plaines, Illinois during the 8:00 hour yesterday morning. Firefighters responded to a car being struck by a Metra train as the vehicle apparently tried to go around the crossing gates. The car flipped over and caught fire, killing a 51-year-old man. This caused a traffic jam. A woman in labor and her husband were on the way to the hospital and got caught in the backup. They called 911. Paramedics who were at the railroad crossing came over and finished delivering the baby. Here’s the story.
FDNY barred by judge from hiring new firefighters: A federal judge hearing a discrimination suit over hiring by FDNY has issued an injunction keeping the department from offering jobs to 300 people who had taken the exam. Here are the details.
In Atlanta a judge halts the promotion of 40 lieutenants: An injunction stemming from a lawsuit claiming cheating on a promotion exam is stalling the promotion process in Atlanta. Read more.
Political leaders line up against union’s plan to have the public decide on firefighter cuts: A ballot measure in Palo Alto, California would require the public to vote if the city wants to close firehouses or cut staffing levels. Past city leaders are joining current ones in opposition. Here’s more.
Eight ball in the corner pocket: In Scranton, Pennsylvania firefighters used a variety of extrication tools to cut apart a pool table at a hotel after an eight-year-old boy went a little far with his arm in trying to retrieve a stuck cue ball. He was in it up to his shoulder. Read the story.
This reminds me of an often told story by my father of a guy he knew at the University of Maryland who took a dare and ended up with a cue ball stuck behind his teeth at a Route 1 pool hall. In those days they wouldn’t think of calling the nearby College Park VFD to handle such a thing. It is only when Ed Statter tells his captive audience exactly where they placed the cue stick to help remove this stuck object do people realize they’ve been had.
Providence Fire Videos captured this attempt by Milford, Massachusetts Rescue 1 attempting to leave the station on a medical call. I guess these days you just have to wait your turn.
House fire in British Columbia: Here’s the description with this one - “Just after 7PM on June 3rd 2010, Surrey firefighters were called to a structure fire @ 132nd St & King George Blvd. They arrived to find a vacant building fully involved, and they had reports that someone may still be inside. Crews made an aggressive fire attack to gain entry and search for the possible victim. Luckily, no one was found inside, but a man was taken to hospital by BCAS with undetermined injuries. FD & RCMP are investigating the cause of the fire.”
More from BC: This is from a fire Thurday at the old Silver Ledge Hotel which had been turned into a museum in Ainsworth. One man has been charged with arson after the fire began in a trailer adjacent to the hotel.
Woonsocket, Rhode Island fire: Providence Fire Videos shot this fire on Mowry Street around 4:00 on Thursday morning.
Another one from Providence Fire Videos: A house fire in a non-hydrant area on Buffum Road in Uxbridge, Massachusetts.
Providence Fire Videos shot this video from a two-alarm house fire in Bellingham, Massachusetts. According to Providence Fire Videos, a power line came down on Engine 1. No reports of injuries or further details.
Last May we ran another story and video from Bellingham where live electrical wires on the front yard prevented crews from reaching a hydrant. Click here for that one.
In Milford, Massachusetts yesterday, a three-alarm fire gutted an apartment building on Pine Street. The Milford Daily News was on the scene and has video and still pictures of a man being brought down an aerial ladder from a third-floor window as the fire burns below.
Click the image for more pictures by Jacob Belcher, Milford Daily News.
The crews eventually went to exterior operations, which you will hear and see on the video above by Metro West Videos and the one below by Providence Fire Videos. At the bottom are aerial views later in the operation.
Fire Chief John Touhey said no one was hurt in the blaze at 31 Pine St., which was caused by careless smoking. It sparked when a cigarette ignited a tenant’s bed in a first-floor apartment, the chief said.
Rescuers used a ladder truck to reach a tenant who was hanging out of his third-floor bedroom window, unable to escape with all the thick smoke and fire.
“I’m all right, just a little shaken up,” said Gary Howe, 42, right after he was helped down the fire truck’s extended ladder to the ground.
Touhey said the fire, reported at 12:44 p.m., got out of control as crews needed to concentrate first on people’s safety.
Flames shot from the first floor up three stories to the roof, and drifting smoke forced the evacuation and closing of the town library next door.
Firefighters, who took hoses inside the house to attack the fire, had to evacuate, fearing the building would collapse.
Crews with Milford Ladder 1, on one side, and Franklin Tower 1, on the other, drenched the house with 1,600 gallons of water per minute for about an hour until the flames finally were extinguished.
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