Three Kansas City, Mo., firefighters were taken to a hospital for treatment after being injured in a house fire early Saturday.
The two-alarm fire broke out before 6 a.m. at a home near 56th Street and Holmes Road and firefighters said the initial call for help came from a bedroom in the home.
When they arrived, flames were coming from the first and second story of the house, firefighters said.
Kansas City, Mo., Fire Chief Smokey Dyer tells KMBC 9’s Justin Robinson what happened in a fire early Saturday that left three firefighters injured.
Kansas City Fire Chief Smokey Dyer said crews went inside and started to go up the stairs, when conditions inside the house suddenly changed. He said it burned the fire hose and left the firefighters completely surrounded by flames. The firefighters sent out a mayday call for help, Dyer said.
Dyer said there may have been a flashover in the home, but that he couldn’t say that definitively until there had been a full investigation. A flashover happens when an area of a fire suddenly ignites.
"In the past 10 years, every significant firefighter injury that we have sustained in fire combat has been a result of a rapid change of conditions," Dyer said.
"There’s no doubt we had a serious near-miss this morning."
He said one of the firefighters had his mask dislodged while leaving the house and inhaled smoke and heat. Two others suffered minor injuries inside the house and all three were taken to Research Medical Center for treatment. Dyer said he expected all three to be released from the hospital some time on Saturday.
"Our people are doing very well," he said. "There’s no doubt we had a serious near-miss this morning and we could have ended up with multiple firefighters seriously injured or killed."
Dyer said the fire was under control a short time later. No one inside the house was injured.
Investigators have not said how the fire started.
The names of the injured firefighters have not yet been released.
