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Christmas Day Commercial Building Fire
By Fire Captain Daniel Burroughs
December 25, 2014
On Christmas Day as most people were having lunch and opening gifts with they're families the volunteers from Bay District were responding to a Water Flow Alarm at the Lowe's at 12:47 hours.
Engine 91 responded shortly after dispatched followed by Engine 31 and Tower 9 a few minutes later. Engine 91 did a 360 of the building and took its own hydrant on Side A by the main entrance and continued to investigate. Captain 3 arrived and established command at this time. Engine 31 arrived and command staged Engine 31 on Side C with the hydrant and the FDC connection. Tower 9 arrived and went to Side D to go to the roof and check the hvac systems. Engine 91 made entry through the main entrance and found smoke inside the building. Command had dispatch upgrade the assignment to a Commercial Building Fire as Engine 91 deployed their 400 ft attack line and also took the standpipe racks with them for an additional 200 feet.
As the call was upgraded this brought out Truck 3, Engine 132, Engine 73 and command requested Truck 7 also run the call as well. Engine 31 made entry though the rear of the building as it's driver connected to the FDC. Chief 3A had the interior operations as Engine 132 arrived next and took the hydrant on the C/D corner and made entry through the lumber department doors and made their way to assist Engine 91. Engine 91 advised the fire was in aisle 20 and had 2 activated sprinkler heads and the fire was out. Chief 3 arrived and assumed command as Chief 7B arrived as well. Command requested to Chief 7B to shut off the PIV valve to stop the flow of water from the sprinkler system. Truck 7 arrived and took side A of the building went to the roof due to a malfunction on Tower 9 keeping from getting to the roof. Truck 7 advised the roof was clear and that there were no points on the roof to effectively ventilate the building. Command had Chief 7B run the ventilation group. The fire was put out quickly but there was going to be a lot of ventilation as the entire building was full of smoke. Both the primary and secondary searches of the building were completed with negative results.
Command requested the State Fire Marshall to investigate the cause of the fire. It took roughly 2 hours to properly ventilate the building. All units were back in quarters 15:48 hours.
