Sunday, April 20, 2014  A retired city firefighter who went on to become the head of a specialized team that assisted residents ravaged by disasters died Monday. He was 59.

Luis (Pepe) Fragoso, formerly of Ladder 53 in Harlem and Engine 83 in the Bronx, died of a heart attack at his home, according to friend Lt. Rico Diaz.

The heart attack stemmed from a 9/11-related lung ailment that caused Fragoso to retire in 2002, Diaz said.

But he never stopped helping people.

Fragoso co-founded the FDNY Disaster Assistance Response Team, or DART, a humanitarian force of active and retired FDNY firefighters who render assistance across the United States with the Red Cross. The team's work began in the 1980s, following Hurricane Hugo.

Since then, Fragoso and his team raced to assist people suffering in the aftermath of the Oklahoma City bombing, Hurricane Katrina and other disasters.



He ... [ more ]

Sunday, April 20, 2014  One of the 31 Syracuse firefighters who battled a blaze at a vacant house on the South Side Saturday morning was treated at the hospital for minor injuries.

The firefighter was taken to Upstate University Hospital to be evaluated for burns on his face, said deputy chief Todd Milton.

A neighbor of the vacant two-and-a-half story house at 126 Clyde Avenue called 911 around 8:15 a.m., Milton said.

Firefighters arrived shortly after to a heavy volume of fire on the first floor of the house, he said. It rapidly spread to the second floor and the attic.

An electrical wire that was connected to the house lit up shortly after the first fire engine arrived on scene. The power line fell onto the engine, causing complications for firefighters because they were unable to use the engine or a nearby hydrant until the wire was under control.

National Grid was on scene to assist.

"The live wire is dangerous to us," Milton said. "We b... [ more ]

Saturday, April 19, 2014  Eight people were displaced from a duplex at 182-184 Newark Pompton Turnpike Thursday afternoon and two firefighters injured, one seriously, when a blaze tore through the two story structure, leaving the porch and roof collapsed, authorities said.

The seriously injured firefighter from Great Notch Fire Company No. 4 was hurt when the front porch of the home collapsed on him, Assistant Fire Chief Ronnie Cordero said. Responders rushed him to St. Joseph's Regional Medical Center in Paterson for treatment as he was reporting pain below his legs, he said. Officials later said that he broke his leg.




The other firefighter, a deputy chief, burned his hand while working a hose line and was treated at the scene for... [ more ]

Friday, April 18, 2014  A firefighter was injured Thursday when burned cargo from a tractor-trailer stopped on Interstate 77 fell on him.
The incident was reported at approximately 5:55 p.m. near mile marker 14 just north of Exit 14 on Athens Road. A helicopter ambulance was initially planned, but it was later canceled, according to a dispatcher with Mercer County 911. The Princeton Rescue Squad was dispatched. The firefighter’s identity could not be confirmed Thursday evening.
The Bluestone Valley, Green Valley-Glenwood, Oakvale, East River Volunteer and Princeton Fire Departments were alerted at approximately 3 p.m. when a tractor-trailer fire near mile marker 14 was reported. Fire responders soon learned that bales of cardboard hauled by two truckers were burning.
Traffic was reduced to one lane from the Camp Creek to the Athens Road exits for several hours while firefighters contained the blazes and extinguished fire on a neighboring hillside.
The tractor-trailers’ dri... [ more ]

Friday, April 18, 2014  It took a minute for the man standing on the front porch of the West Pullman home to realize what was going on when his neighbors started yelling to him that his house was burning.

“I’m telling him, man, your house is on fire!” said Bernard Jones, 52, who lives near the home in the 11600 block of South Michigan where eight people, including a two firefighters and a police officer, were injured Tuesday evening.

The man opened the front door as flames leaped from the side of the house toward the second floor, Jones said.

"We look up," Jones said. "There's kids in the window."

A pair of police officers in the area had spotted the burning home, too, and had called it in on their radios about 6 p.m.

Seeing two boys in the upstairs windows, the officers shouted instructions to break the windows and jump into their arms, Police News Affairs Officer Hector Alfaro said.

It was a team effort, with Jones and other people nearby helping d... [ more ]

Thursday, April 17, 2014  A motorist was killed Thursday morning after their vehicle was struck by a Comstock Township firefighter who was responding to a head-on crash on Sprinkle Road, Kalamazoo County Sheriff Richard Fuller said.

Kalamazoo County Sheriff Richard Fuller on the Sprinkle Road fatal accident.

The fatal crash, which occurred between East Michigan Avenue and East Main Street, was reported five to 10 minutes after Comstock firefighters received a report of a serious head-on crash near the intersection of Sprinkle and East Main.Fuller said the initial crash, which was reported at 8:25 a.m., caused traffic on Sprinkle Road to back up and a line of vehicles formed in the northbound lanes.

Fuller said the motorist, whose name, age and gender has not been released, was in the line of northbound traffic and attempted a U-turn to go south on Sprinkle. At tha... [ more ]

Thursday, April 17, 2014  Months after surviving the fertilizer plant explosion, which rocked the small town of West, volunteer firefighter Robert Payne has started going out on calls again. He took his first call in January.

Payne said he was one of the closest firefighters to the blast who survived. “Your heart starts racing at a different speed right now,” said Payne.

Coping with the loss of his fellow firefighters out there with him that night is still a challenge. “It’s something you go through one day at a time.”

Even though one year has passed, time hasn’t healed all of the emotional wounds. “Just the guilt of being here, someone else losing their life trying to protect you and protect others, that’s the first hurdle you got to get over,” said Payne. It’s a huge hurdle he said since he knew the five fallen heroes from West all their lives.

“These guys were the cream of the crop, some of our best. The guys you could count ... [ more ]

Wednesday, April 16, 2014  A space heater is to blame for a fire that displaced seven people early Saturday morning in Stuyvesant Falls, but the family is safe thanks to a quick-thinking girl.

A fire at a house at 920 Route 25 in Stuyvesant Falls owned by the Cowan family was reported to Columbia County 911 at 12:28 a.m. The Stuyvesant Falls Fire Department responded to the scene and was joined by fire companies from Stuyvesant, Stockport, Niverville, West Ghent, Valatie, Chatham, Ghent, Stottville and Kinderhook.



The fire was extinguished at 5:04 a.m. and the scene was cleared at 5:07 a.m. but Columbia County 911 later reported the fire had rekindled and that light smoke conditions were observed at the scene at 7:45 p.m. Saturday. The scene was cleared by Stuyvesant Falls firefighters a second time at 9 p.m.


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Wednesday, April 16, 2014  A woman charged with buying guns for a convicted felon who later used them to kill two volunteer firefighters in an ambush was convicted Tuesday of falsifying business records.

A state Supreme Court jury in Rochester found 25-year-old Dawn Nguyen, of the town of Greece, guilty because she lied when she said on a gun purchase form that she was buying the weapons for her own use. She also faces federal charges.

Prosecutors say Nguyen bought a semi-automatic rifle and a 12-gauge shotgun at a Gander Mountain store in 2010 for her neighbor William Spengler Jr., who was prohibited from owning weapon because of his felony record. Spengler had been released from prison in 1996 after serving 17 years for killing his grandmother with a hammer.

Spengler set fire to his Webster home early on the morning of Dec. 24, 2012, then shot at responding firefighters, killing Michael Chiapperini and Tomasz Kaczowka and wounding Joseph Hofstetter and Ted Sca... [ more ]

Wednesday, April 16, 2014  A Saxis firefighter was seriously injured and another was treated for smoke inhalation while fighting a fire that burned around 3,000 acres of marsh and woodland in northwest Accomack County on Sunday.

Saxis Fire Chief Coley Beasley sustained first degree burns to the face and second degree burns to the hands and arms fighting the blaze, which took crews more than 12 hours to contain.

Beasley was transported to Peninsula Regional Medical Center and transferred to the John Hopkins Burn Center in Baltimore, Md.

He was released Tuesday and is recovering at home, Saxis Volunteer Fire and Rescue President Aubrey Justice said.

The blaze, which was reported to the Eastern Shore of Virginia 911 Center at 11:19 a.m. April 13, began as a small brush fire along Saxis Road near Sanford. Pushed by strong winds, it spread northeast to Shad Landing Road before firefighters were able to bring it under control, C. Ray Pruitt of the Accomack Count... [ more ]

Wednesday, April 16, 2014  An Elmwood Park fire captain had a blood alcohol content 2½ times the legal limit when he crashed a firetruck while returning from a call over the weekend, CLIFFVIEW PILOT has learned.


Russell Fenn IV, 37, was “visibly swaying” after the engine slammed into several utility poles on East 54th Street and Molnar Drive around 1:15 a.m. Sunday, Bergen County Police Department Capt. James Mullin told CLIFFVIEW PILOT this afternoon.

Another firefighter in the rig had to be taken to Hackensack University Medical Center with what appeared to be minor injuries, he said. The engine was taken out of service — leaving borough firefighters one short in battling a blaze at a Route 46 hotel this afternoon (SEE: Firefighters find rooms empty after hotel fire).

... [ more ]

Wednesday, April 16, 2014  Idaho officials have filed a lawsuit against a timber company and its contractor contending they're responsible for a wildfire that killed a 20-year-old Forest Service firefighter and burned more than 300 acres in northern Idaho.
The state filed the lawsuit Monday in 2nd District Court seeking an unspecified amount in monetary damages for costs in fighting the fire. Firefighter Anne Veseth of Moscow died Aug. 12, 2012, after being struck and killed by a falling tree while fighting the Steep Corner Fire near Orofino.