Fire union president talks dangers of Fall River apartment fire

January 3, 2019 4:59 pm

FALL RIVER, Mass. (WLNE) — Firefighters are ready to work towards changes to make their jobs safer after that massive fire in Fall River sent 8 firefighters to the hospital. All of them will be okay but fire officials say the number sent for evaluation is worrisome.

No doubt about it, firefighters have a dangerous job.
But the Fall River fire union president says it’s getting worse because of the way products are made today.

It was an absolute beast of a fire. It took more than a day to put out and sent 8 firefighters to the hospital with smoke inhalation or cyanide poisoning.

“That was a large number and it created a lot of stress. The reports of another guy and another guy going to the hospital,” says Jason Burns the president of IAFF Local 1314.

Because of where the building is geographically, the smoke just sat on top of the area, firefighters breathing in smoke unprotected for hours on end. The first ones to arrive acted so quickly to rescue the women trapped in the car, some didn’t even put their protective masks on.

“That happens but you also have so many people on the perimeter that have job duties and when the smoke is just stagnant sitting there, they’re breathing it in and we were at that scene for 30 hours,” says Burns.

They have breathing masks with bottles of air that will last for about a half hour. But for a fire this big, they’re going through bottles rapidly and since they have to re-filled at the fire station, resources are limited.

Conversations on how to work more efficiently with what they have are ongoing.

“How do we do all this while combating that scene, those are things we have to fine tune,” says Burns.

And what’s in the smoke these days is very different than decades ago. The plastic so many things are made with burn toxic smoke.

“We have to find a way w the current resources to maximize how we protect ourselves. You’re never going to eliminate the risk we know that but I also don’t want to be unnecessarily put in harm,” says Burns.

One thing coming down the pike, legislation on Governor Baker’s desk that would ban the sale of certain flame retardant materials that cause toxic smoke.