10/18/1984 Alexander Hamilton Hotel fire killed fifteen and injured over fifty in Paterson, NJ. located at the corner of Market and Church Streets. The fire started at 12:14 a.m. and went to three-alarms in the eight-story building, trapping some victims and forcing others to jump. The fire was deliberately set by Russell Conklin who was charged with murder and arson and lived in the hotel. The fire was confined to the third floor of the eight-story steel frame fire resistive hotel with 169 guest rooms or living suites on the upper six floors. Products of combustion traveled to upper floors where the majority of the deaths occurred; the stairway doors were not closed, and vertical ventilation shafts spread smoke to the upper story guest rooms.
10/18/1902 an Albany, New York firefighter “was killed while operating at a two-alarm store fire.”
10/18/1919 a Philadelphia, PA firefighter “died after a fall through a skylight at a fire at 435 Lombard Street on October 15, 1919.”
10/18/1952 a Buffalo, NY firefighter died while fighting a fire at a repair shop on Main St. He was working a hoseline inside the smoke-filled structure when he was overcome. He was carried outside and received first aid until Rescue Squad 4 arrived. He was pronounced dead at Sisters Hospital.”
10/18/2014 an early-morning fire in McKeesport, Allegheny County, PA killed six family members, four children and two adults, and critically injured another in a fire that began in the living room on the first floor.
10/18/2010 Harrisburg, PA a house fire that started from a space heater killed a 48-year-old woman and four children, ages two through four-years-old.
10/18/2009 Weirton, WV two women, ages 44 and 28 and a two-year-old child were killed in a home fire; the home had no working smoke alarms.
10/18/1998 a pipeline explosion in Jesse, Nigeria, killed 700 people and the resulting fire burned for nearly a week. The gas pipelines ran through impoverished villages; it was a common practice for residents to steal oil from the pipeline to supplement their incomes. “Specialists from Houston, Texas, arrived with firefighting foam that helped the firefighters extinguish the blaze.”
10/18/1884 Easton, PA an incendiary fire destroyed Bernard Coyle & Son’s Icehouse, W. U. Stocker & Company’s Sawmill, and the Taylor & Company’s store. The rapidly spreading fire started in the icehouse.
10/18/1956 Pineola, FL four people were killed when two Atlantic Coast Line freight trains collided head-on on a straightaway.