TWO PEOPLE WERE INJURED THURSDAY MORNING AFTER A HEAD-ON COLLISION SENT A BOX TRUCK CRASHING INTO A HOUSE IN UPPERCO, BALTIMORE COUNTY, MARYLAND

TWO PEOPLE WERE INJURED THURSDAY MORNING AFTER A HEAD-ON COLLISION SENT A BOX TRUCK CRASHING INTO A HOUSE IN UPPERCO, BALTIMORE COUNTY, MARYLAND

January 29, 2015

UPPERCO, Md. —Two people were flown to Shock Trauma Thursday morning after a collision sent a truck crashing into a house in Upperco, Baltimore County police said.

Police said the truck went about 15 feet into a vacant house in the 15400 block of Hanover Pike shortly after 10 a.m.

Officials said the truck was traveling north on Hanover Pike and a Honda Prelude was traveling south when the two vehicles collided. Each driver was trapped and had to be rescued, officials said. The chain of events is unclear at this early stage of the investigation.

"The drivers of both vehicles were trapped and fire (officials) called for heavy rescue assignment at 10:14. That brought out the equipment that we needed to free these people from the vehicles," police spokeswoman Elise Armacost said.

Two people were flown to Shock Trauma. They were each listed in serious condition, although their injuries were not life-threatening, officials said.

Baltimore County fire and police officials shut down Hanover Pike in both directions in the area of Emory Road for hours.

Crash investigators and building inspectors were called to the scene. The Baltimore County Fire Department Urban Search and Rescue Team was also called to shore up the house.

"They're there to try to shore up that house to protect against collapse that could be dangerous to the responders or anyone around," Armacost said.

A hazardous materials team removed fuel from the truck in order to safely remove it from the scene.

MORE THAN A DOZEN DISPLACED AFTER NORTHEAST SIDE OF SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS FIRE AT APARTMENT COMPLEX

MORE THAN A DOZEN DISPLACED AFTER NORTHEAST SIDE OF SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS FIRE AT APARTMENT COMPLEX

January 29, 2015

 

SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS — More than a dozen people are displaced after a fire at a Northeast Side apartment complex destroyed several units on Thursday.

Firefighters battled the blaze, which erupted in the second floor of an apartment complex just after 11:30 a.m. in the 1000 block of Garrity Road.

Crews arrived to find heavy fire in the building on the second and first floor. Initial reports were that about five people may have been inside the building. Crews conducted a search and confirmed the buildings were empty and began fighting the blaze.

Conditions inside the structure were unsafe and firefighters were forced outside the building to battle the fire.  This is similar to the procedure followed by the vols of Edgewater, New Jersey in fighting the massive fire at Avalon of Edgewater last week.  Playing safe for the firefighters and just let the building burn.

DESPITE THE RECENT DEADLY MANSION FIRE IN MARYLAND, VIRGINIANS FAR MORE LIKELY TO DIE IN A FIRE THAN MARYLANDERS, BECAUSE OF THE STRICTER MD FIRE CODE REQUIREMENTS

DESPITE THE RECENT DEADLY MANSION FIRE IN MARYLAND, VIRGINIANS FAR MORE LIKELY TO DIE IN A FIRE THAN MARYLANDERS, BECAUSE OF THE STRICTER MD FIRE CODE REQUIREMENTS

January 29, 2015

WASHINGTON, DC – After six people lost their lives in an Annapolis mansion fire, firefighters said sprinklers could have made all the difference.  Certainly this may be true, on a common sense basis, but try to explain that to the 1,000 residents of Avalon of Edgewater where last week a fire destroyed 250+ apartments, all fully equipped with fire sprinklers.

The sprinklers are required in new Maryland homes but in Virginia, one fire chief says chances aren’t as good.

Loudoun County Fire Chief Keith Brower says homes are built with highly flammable materials, contain more synthetics and plastics than ever before  and are burning faster than even 10 years ago.

“The escape time we say has reduced from an average of 10-13 minutes to 3-4 minutes,” Brower says.

Sprinklers can buy residents time and contain the fire until help arrives, he says. But unlike in Maryland, Virginia localities can’t make changes to the building code and codes in the Commonwealth say sprinklers aren’t required.

“You go rent a hotel room it’s got a sprinkler in it, ‘Hey, you’re safe.’ You come home after vacation thinking your safe and your home is not protected and that’s where you’re going to die,” he says.

He says all states typically subscribe to a national family of code, the International Code Congress.  At the latest national hearings, sprinklers were included in residential occupancies in one and two family dwellings. But Virginia does not adhere to the ICC code.

“In Virginia, sprinklers and other fire detection and fire suppression features are governed in the building code. The building code in Virginia is pursuant to state law,” Brower says.

State law doesn’t give localities the authority to change the building code. In Maryland, sprinklers are required in all new construction since 2004. Prince George’s county was one of the first in the country to require sprinklers in single family homes.

“Townhouses and single familes are excluded in Virginia from the building code as far as requirements for sprinklers,” Brower says.

Virginia homeowners can retrofit their houses with sprinklers, but many choose not to.

Home builders in Maryland don’t have that choice. Former Prince Georges County Fire Chief Ron Siarnicki says no one has died in a home with sprinklers in the county’s history.

That fact alone, he says, proves sprinklers are worth the investment.

“My guess is [they are] somewhere between 1 percent and 1.5 percent of the total cost of the house. So you’re talking about the same as a carpeting upgrade. And the protection you get from that is 1,000 fold because your family is going to be protected for the life that you live in the house,” Siarnicki says.

Both career firefighters says they’ve heard a number of reasons against installing sprinklers, the most common being the cost or fear of water damage they’ll cause.

On that point, Brower cited an old adage in firefighting: Things dry out, but they don’t unburn.

FIRE LEAVES 20 NEW HAVEN RESIDENTS OUT IN BITTER COLD. THE CAUSE AND ORIGIN OF THE FIRE IS UNDER INVESTIGATION.

FIRE LEAVES 20 NEW HAVEN RESIDENTS OUT IN BITTER COLD.  THE CAUSE AND ORIGIN OF THE FIRE IS UNDER INVESTIGATION.

January 29, 2015

NEW HAVEN, Conn. (WTNH)– A fire in New Haven forced more than 20 people out into the bitter cold Thursday.

The flames broke out in the walls of a building on Spring Street at about 6:15 in the morning. There’s a restaurant on the first floor and about a dozen apartment units upstairs.

Everybody who was inside made it out safely. But the cold conditions made an already tough situation, even more difficult for firefighters.

“It does hamper our efforts, slips and falls, hydrants are frozen, in the case we ended up pretty good. Firefighters not so much, it’s laborious work but the guys did an outstanding job,” said Battalion Chief William Gould, New Haven Fire Dept.

The fire department says those residents probably won’t be allowed back into their apartments for at least a day. The cause of the fire is still under investigation.