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Fire on Fairmount
10/07/2010 6:40 AM by John M
Reports are coming in of what sounds like fairly involved fire on the 1800 block of Fairmount earlier this morning, at one of the businesses or the restaurant at that intersection.
wtvr is saying that the fire was at Sandra’s.
RTD reports that fire “caused extensive damage at Sandra’s Soul Food.”
Didnt Sandras have a fire or other clamity just a few years ago?
This is the second fire to occur on Church Hill while Quint 1 (from the firehouse at Broad and 24th) was closed down for the day. The same thing occured at the fire a few weeks ago on O St. I wonder how much larger these fires grew waiting for help to come from further away?
Isn’t the fire station on 28th St closer to Sandra’s, or is fire house 1 the only one equip to fight that type of fire on this side of town?
It’s not so much an issue of equipment as it is of manpower. When we get to a fire, there’s scene size-up, establishment of water supply, deployment of handlines, forcible entry, ventilation, search and rescue, fire attack,laddering the building, and providing medical care for any victims or firefighters that need it. That’s all within about the first five or ten minutes. All of that is doable with the equipment on a single quint, but it’s a whole lot easier to do it with eight or twelve people than with four.
Strike “easier” and insert “more efficient.” It ain’t easy.
Thanks for the explanation. I guess I always thought that one fire station responds, and only if it is really bad does another one respond, and with the fire station at 28th St being close, that there was no effect on response time.
Staffing is a huge issue for fire departments everywhere. Since the fire service isn’t revenue-generating, local governments tend to look at it as a good place to cut costs. It’s hard to wrap the bureaucratic mind around the idea of paying someone just to be ready, and it’s hard for us to think there won’t be anyone there to back us up. RFD has lost something like 150 positions in the last 25 years.
We’re always trying different programs to increase our presence in the community; we just started a citywide neighborhood canvass to provide free smoke detectors/installation for any city resident. Within the next few weeks, folks should be hearing a knock on the door, or finding a yellow door-hanger if we miss you. We did a home safety survey/smoke detector blitz maybe eight years ago-ish…I was up on the Hill then and we put up roughly eighty gazillion detectors.
Richmons has budget problems. Things are going to get worst before they get better. More fire stations and companies being shut down.
Folks need to call their council person and the Mayor and complain!! Now!
Jones announces $6.7M budget surplus (CHPN 9/13/2010)