GT Mechanical

The Second Page

The fire Saturday night at GT Mechanical was a good example of serious and efficient fire fighting as the firemen saved the building and did so safely and with a minimum loss of property damage. The pictures on this page were extracted from video of the event and are shown here in sequence.
Making that initial attack is one of the most important phases in fighting a fire as you have to be ready and prepared for blowback and have lots of water and crewmen available for the first assault. The two pictures above and the one below right illustrate this readiness process. A few spectators gathers around the site to see the fire department do their job.
With every available man suited up and working the fire former firemen pitched in to supervise the pumper operations that back up the men holding onto the hoses.
The camera reveals the firemen making their entrance into the West side of the shop area while below right is an image of the dials on the front of one of the fire engines as it charges the hoses to the men.
In the pictures below you can see the scene as the owner in the shadows survey's the process and the emergency lighting illuminates the door and inside the building as the smoke still chokes off the light.

There is no alternative but to cut into the roof and dig out the fire that if left would consume the building.

This battle on the roof was perhaps the most difficult task of all with saw, crowbar and water hoses to wrestle up onto the roof and work pretty much in the dark with smoke billowing up from below.
Fortunately temperatures were just above freezing and though there was a breeze the weather did not prove to be a serious factor in this event.
With the door fully open the smoke began to clear and work on the roof increased as the sparks were coming down from the ceiling. In the picture on the right a fireman is moving a hose so that he can direct water up into the South West corner.
The dots of light below left are sparks falling from the ceiling and the team below right are directing their stream into the ceiling to cool the area down.
The building was saved but more then an hour and half later the firemen were still working on the scene hauling out equipment from the inside, picking up hoses and equipment from the successful attack they had made on the enemy fire.