Home scheduled to burn Sunday morning

January 28, 2009 by pamliconews

Local fire officials will conduct a ‘live burn’ Sunday morning of this dwelling on the outskirts of Oriental.

Valuable training for area firefighters

JEFF AYDELETTE
PAMLICO NEWS STAFF

Flames are expected to engulf an unoccupied dwelling on Hwy. 55 just outside the Oriental town line Sunday morning, part of a ‘live burn’ training exercise for area firefighters that recently received the go-ahead from Pamlico County Emergency Management Coordinator David Spruill, who doubles as both the local Fire Marshal and a certified live burn instructor.
By mid-afternoon, the mobile home, set on a cinderblock foundation, should be a smoldering ruins, which is just fine with owner Ben Giacchino, who recently OK’d the planned exercise as a way to minimize demolition costs for the decrepit structure.

“The house itself is just not livable ever since I owned it, otherwise I would have rented it,” he explained. “It’s really beyond repair. I was going to have it demolished, but before I did that, I said ‘Wait a minute, maybe the fire department can use it.’ I contacted Southeast Pamlico (volunteer fire department) and they said it was my lucky day because they had just contacted the Fire Marshal and needed a place to burn.”

Giacchino, a real estate agent, paid for a required asbestos inspection, which indicated no significant levels of the dangerous material. That allowed Spruill to proceed with a significant amount of paperwork, most geared toward safety precautions and air quality concerns, before he authorized the exercise.

“The Chief of a fire department can burn a house,” he said, “but if anything happens, he is responsible. The advantage of having a live burn instructor present is that we are familiar with all of the standards. For example, there must be two different sources of water, you need to have ‘incident command’ procedures set up, and EMS (emergency management services) should be on the scene.”

Tentative plans call for several volunteer firefighters, currently enrolled in fire control classes at Pamlico Community College, to enter the building in full gear while one or more rooms are ablaze.

“Basically we set the fire beforehand using wooden pallets and hay,” said Spruill. “We always have a three-man team -- a nozzle man, a backup man, and a slack man. And, we always, always have a second team, with an instructor, waiting and all packed up just in case.”

Valuable training and a savings on demolition costs makes the scheduled exercise a win-win situation, according to both Spruill and Giacchino. Real life scenarios are impossible to replicate in either a classroom or on the community college training grounds.

“An actual structure fire should be as safe as possible but we also attempt to make it as realistic as it can possibly be,” said Spruill. “Until you get in a burning house, you can’t really conceive it. This is a chance for firemen to see a real fire, see what it does, and see what they don’t want it to do.”

Permalink