Bill Packard: The Big One
No matter how small your town or fire department may be, there are large structures that can burn as large fires and our town was no exception. In the center of town was the local grocery store located in a building that housed the Masonic Lodge on the second floor. One beautiful summer Sunday afternoon, proprietors there refused to sell some beer to clearly intoxicated individuals and one of them decided to set the building on fire.
While the front was clapboard siding, the other three sides were asphalt shingles and once the fire in the cardboard at the loading dock got started, there was no stopping it.
We had preplanned fighting fires in this building, along with the others in the common area. There was a plan in place and mutual aid units had been identified, so we felt pretty confident we could handle a fire in this building despite the small size of the fire department.
We were wrong.
We have a hydrant system that flows very little water, but the best hydrant, 250 gallons per minute, was nearby so an attack pumper was to lay a big line from that hydrant and park in front of the building.
The second engine would take the hydrant and pump the line. Two hundred and fifty gpm is inadequate for a significant fire in a building that size, but it’s water that sustained and buys you time to set up a more elaborate water supply.
The first in piece drove right by the hydrant, turned into the alley beside the building and parked out back, completely useless.
The second piece stopped at the hydrant and seeing no line, laid up to the fire and backed back to pump the hydrant.
The first in piece was repositioned in front of the building and we went to work. Dump stations were set up and tankers shuttled from two locations. We flowed enough tanker water to supply an aerial device, but that fire was ripping.
Despite the intensity of the fire, we knew we had it contained. The general public did not. The neighbors were evacuating and taking all they could carry.
Even though we were sure there would be no extension, we allowed them to remove their stuff. It kept them busy and made them feel good.
The store and the Masonic Hall burned to the ground, but no other buildings were damaged.
It was a good lesson in humility. In the case of all large fires, the outcome is usually determined before the tone goes off. Despite our best efforts, the end result will often be the destruction of the building.
That’s a tough deal for chief officers in volunteer fire departments to come to grips with. When you’re the chief officer and a building burns to the ground, you feel a tremendous amount of self-doubt and maybe even a little guilt. Like you didn’t do your job.
I was very fortunate in that the chief and I would talk almost nightly about everything that was going on in the department and after every fire of any size, we’d analyze and discuss what went right and what we could have done better. After this fire, we beefed up our preplan and tightened mutual aid assignments for another fire on the common. It came a few years later.
I was in Cleveland having dinner with my son at the Rock Bottom Brewery when I got the phone call. The Odd Fellows building was on fire on the common.
This building was as large as the Masonic Lodge/grocery store, but had an apartment house about four feet away.
The fate of this building was determined before the fire department arrived and that was documented in a video a neighbor made that showed fire coming out the wall on the third floor. This was serious.
All the phone conversations, preplanning and walking around the buildings paid off. When the fire units left the scene that night, the apartment building was undamaged. The other neighbor who took that valuable video footage was undamaged, as well, even though he was sure his building was going to burn to the ground.
As happens in every department, there are people who don’t take responsibility but are quick to criticize. This was the case at this fire and it really troubled me.
The chief had stopped this fire in a three story, fully involved structure from extending to an occupied building four feet away. I thought it was an awesome feet for a small town, volunteer fire department.
Of course it got a lot of publicity, like any big fire does, but it always bothered me that the chief never really got the recognition he deserved for that save. I can say that in our phone calls after that fire, his excitement and enthusiasm for the outcome was apparent.
If you aspire to be an officer in a volunteer department and maybe someday even a chief officer, one of the things you’ll have to come to grips with is that some buildings burn down. It comes with the territory. It’s tough, but you have to realize that most of the time the fate of the building was determined before you ever knew it was on fire, and your focus needs to be on protecting anything else that could catch fire around it.
More Bill Packard
Volunteer firefighting is one of the most rewarding, fun things anyone can do if they’re on a department with the right culture. My hope is that these stories can create enough interest in even one person to join a local department and feel the satisfaction that comes from being a firefighter and understand what makes it so special.
Bill Packard lives in Union and is the founder of BPackard.com. He is a speaker, author, small business coach and consultant.
Bottom line, don’t run out of water
Anything you save is important
Wires down, people trapped... and the night half the county went dark
