Dbq Fire Safety

In Worcester, Massachusetts, between 4:30 and 5:45 PM on December 3rd, 1999, a five-alarm fire was started by two homeless people on the second floor of a presumed-to-be abandoned six-story cold-storage and warehouse facility. A total of seventy-three firefighters responded to the scene, and the fire claimed the lives of six of them. The two homeless people, unknown to the responders, left the building shortly after the fire started without reporting it. The fire burned unchecked for between half an hour and an hour and a half, until it was finally noticed that smoke was coming out of the top of the building by an off-duty police officer. The officer then called it in, and the first alarm rang at 6:15 PM. Search and rescue operations commenced once

responders to the first alarm arrived at the scene. Shortly thereafter, two of the firefighters got lost while inside the building searching for the homeless people, and sent out an emergency signal at 6:47 PM. Once the emergency signal was received, responders from the first and third alarms went in to conduct search and rescue operations for the two homeless people as well as the two lost firefighters.

Two of these firefighter subsequently became lost as well, and had to radio incident command at 7:10 PM for assistance in finding their way out of the building, as they were running low on air. Again, at 7:14, they radioed in for help. Two more firefighters entered the building at an unknown point in time, as they reportedly never made contact with incident command or anyone else at the scene; it is unknown whether they were conducting search and rescue for the other four firefighters or initially went in to search for the homeless people. In any case, it was realized at 7:24 PM that a total of six firefighters were missing after a head count was conducted. Search and rescue efforts continued for the six missing firefighters until 8:00 PM; after firefighters on the fourth floor radioed in that the building’s structural integrity was compromised, and it was reported to the chief that heavy fire was venting through the roof, it was decided that the search would be called off, and for all firefighters to evacuate the

building. The plan of attack was shifted from offensive to defensive, as the building was determined to be lost, but the fire still needed to be stopped from spreading further. The fire was eventually knocked down and search and rescue efforts resumed, until the bodies of the six firefighters were recovered during the following eight days.