STRUCTURE FIRE

Date & Time: Wednesday, September 12, 2007 – 4:13 a.m.

Location: 129 Route 31, Hopewell Township, N.J.

Details: At 4:08 a.m. Mercer County Central transmitted Box 51-60 and dispatched Pennington Borough (Station 51) and Hopewell Borough (Station 52) fire companies for a smoke condition in a commercial building. Hopewell Township police then arrived and reported heavy smoke pushing from the eaves of a large building housing a nail salon, a dry cleaners and a Quick Chek convenience store. As a result, the assignment was instantly upgraded to a full first alarm and at 4:13 a.m. Hopewell’s Tanker 52, Telesquirt 53 and Tanker 53 from Union Fire Co. of Titusville, and Rescue 22 from Lawrence Road Fire Co. were all dispatched. First-arriving firefighters from Rescue 51 found heavy smoke in the nail salon. Supply lines were laid and the roof laddered. Crews had difficulty finding the source of the smoke. As a result, at 4:38 a.m. Engine 32 from Pennington Road Fire Co. was special-called to the scene. Then at 4:44 a.m. two additional engines – Engine 33 from West Trenton Fire Co. and Lawrence Road’s Engine 22 – were special-called as extra engines. Ultimately, Engine 22 was unable to respond due to insufficient manpower. Eventually, a small fire was discovered inside the nail salon and contained there. The blaze was officially declared under control by 5:15 a.m. Rescue 22’s crew stood by as the rapid intervention team during the incident, while Ff. Commini used Rescue 22’s cascade system to refill several SCBA bottles used by interior crews. Rescue 22 cleared the scene after the last SCBA bottle was refilled and was back in quarters at Station 22 by 5:50 a.m. Apparatus that operated on scene included: Rescue 51, Ladder Tower 51, Tanker 51, Engine 52, Engine 52-1, Tanker 52, Tanker 53, Telesquirt 53, Rescue 22, Engine 32, and Engine 33.

Responding LRFC Personnel

Rescue 22

Officer: Assistant Chief John Britton	Driver: Ff. Charles Commini Sr.
Crew: Lt. Joseph Dlabik Jr.	Crew: Lt. Evan Kutzin
Crew: Ff. Shaun Dlabik	Crew: Ff. Martin Burch.

All photos copyright (c) 2007 by Michael Ratcliffe