The Colton Rural Fire Department receives an average of 330 calls each year. Only about 10% are actual residential fires. The remaining calls consist of public assistance, medical emergencies, motor vehicle crashes, brush fires, and an occasional chimney fire. Because the majority of our calls are urgent but not huge, the volunteers often joke with each other when departing from drills or small calls by saying, “See ya on the big one!” Well, we had the ‘Big One’ Friday night!
Jodi was driving home from work Friday evening when the fire department pager toned out. The call was for a residential fire on Elwood – just a mile or so from our house! Jodi was still 45 minutes away from the station when she heard Brad call in on the radio from Engine 123. Brad, along with 3 other Colton firefighters, were first on scene and confirmed a 2 story residence was venting from the roof (flames already burned a hole through the roof). They tried attacking the fire from the outside but, with no backup firefighters, they began suffering from heat exhaustion. Brad and his attack partner Vern were taken to the Molalla ambulance, AKA the “penalty box”, to rehydrate and recover. Emma, the lead EMT, was very strict about not letting firefighters return to duty before they were ready. The Colton Fire Captain also requested additional assistance from both the Molalla and Estacada fire departments – it was clear we were going to need more engines and more man power! Because the house was so far out from ‘downtown’ Colton, we needed three fire tenders carrying about 3,000 gallons each to shuttle water back and forth from the nearest hydrant…nearly 8 miles away! This was just too far away to keep up with the volume of water initially needed to stop the spread of the fire.
When Jodi arrived at the Elwood fire station, two lieutenants were just getting ready to take off in Engine 123 and Water Tender 126 and she made it in time to get a ride to the scene. By that time the two store building was now a one story, and efforts were focused on keeping the heat down and protecting exposures (ensuring that the residential fire didn’t turn in to a wild land fire). Once the fire was out, the crew spent a long time digging through the debris ensuring that there were no other hot spots that could lead to a flair-up later in the night. We were on scene until almost 11pm, and back at the station cleaning equipment until about 1am. A neighbor reported that we even made the evening news!
Even though the house was a complete loss, the fire department did everything possible to help save personal items. Before the house became fully involved, Randy (our Captain) was able to pull out a few boxes of photos, a computer, and a file box of important documents. Once the fire was completely out, two of the firefighters found a box of knick knacks, including a pair of white baby shoes, burried beneath the rubble.
This was quite the experience – relief that no one was injured, sadness for the complete loss of the home and their possessions, but such an amazing adrenaline rush!
Here is the original page for all of the Colton apparatus. After this came 2 retones for additional manpower and mutual aid calls to 2 seperate nearby towns to bring in additional water tenders and engines!
Fire Dispatch Call
While around back of the house attacking the fire, Brad heard a loud ‘bang’ and a propane bottle exploded only feet from him. Here’s the bottle:
And here is the burn site the day after…
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