EAGLE 2

Photo: U.S. Government
Arlington County firefighters and paramedics transfer patients to the U.S. Park Police helicopter "Eagle 2" at the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001.

GOV. KAINE

Photo: Arlington County web site
Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine meets Arlington County firefighters at ceremony in 2006. Rescue 104 is in the background.

911 CENTER

Arlington County ECC - Emergency Communications Center

FACTORY FIRE

CLICK ON PHOTO FOR LARGER IMAGE

Photo: www.acfd3.com

LADDERS UP!

Photo: www.acfd3.com
Dec. 7, 2008 - Two-alarm fire at 124 Rolling Trace, Falls Church

BUCK & TUCK

Buck Cumberland (left) served for many years as chief of the Cherrydale Volunteer Fire Department in Arlington County, Virginia. His brother, Tuck, was chief of the Ballston Volunteer Fire Department, also in Arlington.

Photo: Cherrydale VFD

PLANT FIRE

Photo: www.acfd9.com

Fire at concrete plant, 2006

OLD WOODLAWN

Photo: Falls Church Volunteer Fire Dept. web site

Crews on the scene of an April 1974 fire at the old Woodlawn School, which was located at 4715 North 15th Street. Today, the old school building is occupied by the Capital Hospice in-patient unit. Woodlawn School was merged into the H-B Woodlawn school in Cherrydale in 1978.

HECHINGER FIRE - 1969

Photos: Falls Church Voluteer Fire Dept. web site

Images of fire at the Hechinger hardware store in the City of Falls Church on May 31, 1969

HOLIDAY INN - 1987

On Aug. 23, 1987, an underground transformer exploded in the parking lot of the Holiday Inn in Rosslyn, ``sending a billowing tower of flames and black smoke high into the air,'' The Washington Post reported. Firefighters expressed concern about exposure to the chemical PCB used in the transformers at the hotel at 1850 Fort Myer Dr.

JACKSON CITY

Jackson City - a notorious strip once located along the Potomac River, near the current Boundary Channel Drive and Jefferson Davis Highway - was a fire trap.

Nicknamed the ``The Monte Carlo of America,'' the settlement featured all the ingredients for a memorable night on the town - saloons, gambling houses, bordellos, vice dens and a race track.

On July 14, 1902, flames swept a row of card parlors, as The Washington Post reported:

``Fire that originated in a policy shop last night wiped out every gambling house in Jackson City, at the Virginia end of the Long Bridge. (It) was not much of a fire when it started - a bucketful of water would have quenched it - but the habitues were so absorbed at the roulette wheel and faro table that they refused to put cut the blaze.''

District of Columbia firefighters doused the flames, the shops were repaired - and the games returned.

Fire also visited Jackson City on Nov. 30, 1893, and the next day's Washington Post said:

``Monte Carlo, the notorious resort at Jackson City, is in ashes. About 11:30 o'clock last night fire broke out in one of the row of frame buildings occupied by the free and easy, and before the flames could be checked almost the entire row was destroyed. The fire started in James Wells' one-story building on the west side of the road.''

The final fire broke out in 1904 when a band of vigilantes - ``The Good Citizens League'' - cleared out the undesirable elements and set much of Jackson City alight, according to the Arlington County Historical Society.

LUNA PARK - 1915

On April 19, 1915, fire destroyed the roller coaster at Luna Park, a forgotten amusement park which was located in the vicinity of Glebe Road and Jefferson Davis Highway.

``The origin of the fire is thought to have been from sparks from a blaze in the woods adjoining the park,'' The Washington Post reported. `` The flames spread through the woods, destroying a considerable section. No estimate was placed on the loss.

``The fact that the structure destroyed was isolated from others of the park and the wind blowing away from them in all probability prevented the destruction of every building on the grounds,'' the Post reported.

According to a history of Arlington County, posted on the county's web site:

``This amusement park, located in the area where Glebe Road meets Route 1, was built in 1906 for more than $350,000. It claimed facilities for 3,000 picnickers as well as a large ballroom, restaurant and circus arena.

``Exhibits were housed in large buildings of various styles -- Gothic, Moorish, and Japanese. A 'shoot-the-chutes' with a 350-foot incline was a leading attraction. The park was eventually damaged by fire and dismantled in 1915.''

At that time, the closest fire stations were located in the City of Alexandria and the District of Columbia.

HORSES SAVED

About 2oo U.S. Army horses were saved from a stable fire at Fort Myer on Oct. 24, 1925. The blaze was ``started by a short circuit in the electric wiring in Battery A stables'' and ``destroyed the stable and because of lack of water threatened to spread to surrounding buildings housing artillery equipment,'' according to the next day's Washington Post.

ALL HANDS!

Photo: http://www.acfd3.com/

Ballston Volunteer Fire Department, circa 1920s

Clarendon was the scene of a general alarm fire in September 1924.

``Fire yesterday afternoon in the home of Miss A.L. McCoy, 307 Popular avenue, Clarendon, caused a loss of $3,000,'' The Washington Post reported on Sept. 13 of that year.

``Fire companies irom Cherrydale, Ballston, Arlington and Clarendon found the roof in flames and seeing several frame houses close by in danger, a second alarm was sounded, bringing out all the apparatus in Arlington County,'' the newspaper said.

FALSE ALARMS - 1923

``A concerted effort is being launched in Arlington County to apprehend the person who is calling out the fire apparatus on false alarms. The second false alarm within a week was turned in Monday night, calling the engines to the Texaco Oil Company in Rosslyn.''

- The Washington Post
Sept. 26, 1923

OLD ROSSLYN

Oct. 23, 1916

FIREMEN AID IN ROSSLYN

Engine and Hose Wagon Sent to Fight Blaze Across River.

Late yesterday Afternoon Engine Company, No. 5, and the hose wagon of Truck Company, No. 5, went to Rosslyn, Va., on orders of Chief Wagner for a fire of undetermined origin in a two-story stable owned and occupied by W.O. Pickett.

In days of old, the District of Columbia Fire Department sometimes made runs into Rosslyn, just across the Potomac River from Georgetown via the old Aquaduct Bridge. Chief Frank J. Wagner (mentioned in the newspaper excerpt) was chief of the D.C. Fire Department from December 1908 to September 1920.

RIVER SEARCH

UPDATED MAY 9, 2009

Photo: Fox TV web site
On April 26, 2009, firefighters from the District of Columbia and Arlington County scoured the Potomac River between Chain Bridge and Key Bridge for an 11-year-old boy who fell into the river south of Chain Bridge. His body was found more than a week later. He had been fishing from the shore. D.C. Fireboat No. 2 is pictured above. The body of a fisherman, who was reported missing by his family after he failed to return home, was also located several days later. He jumped into the Potomac to rescue the boy, police said.

2111 JEFF DAVIS

UPDATED

Photos: Courtesy of Larry Patterson

These are images of a high-rise apartment fire at 2111 Jefferson Davis Highway in Crystal City in February 1979 as photographed by Larry Patterson, who served as a fire department volunteer.

Firefighters said the blaze looked like a ``towering inferno'' and had the intensity of a ``blowtorch.''

Lt. John Walker, of Truck 79, suffered severe respiratory injuries that ultimately led to his retirement. Patterson said Walker may be the firefighter on the hoseline in the top photo. Several other firefighters suffered lesser injuries.

``We were fighting a losing battle,'' said Assistant Fire Chief John Spink, quoted by The Washington Post.

For 90 minutes, crews struggled against the flames.

Courtesy of retired Capt. Howard Piansky

CLICK on newspaper images to read Washington Post report

Retired Fire Capt. Howard Piansky was one of the first firefighters to arrive at the blaze and provided this account of the incident:

``I was the wagon driver for 5A and we were of course first in ... The engine pulled up with nothing showing and the crew composed of Captain Rahner and firefighters Piansky, Tabscott and Cooper, with McPherson and Orgel on Rescue 5. McPherson came running into the lobby after the engine company and reported fire showing.

``Hooking up to the standpipe, the crew proceeded towards the apartment on fire when the evacuation alarm sounded, bringing scores of people out into the heavy, down-to-the-knees smoke. (That) caused us to abandon extingushment and make numerous rescues. Several crew members were injured ... and a flashover in the hallway had a least one medic thrown down the stairs.''

TERROR THREAT

Terrorists are threatening a new attack on the nation's capital in retaliation for U.S. missile strikes along the Afghan border, according to news reports.

"Soon we will launch an attack in Washington,'' said Taliban commander Baitullah Mehsud, quoted by the Associated Press on March 31. CBS News reports intelligence officials are concerned Mehsud could eclipse Osama bin Laden as a threat.

CHIEF'S BUGGY

Photo: www.acfd3.com

Battalion Chief Wilber "Gabby" Gray at the wheel of the chief's buggy at the Drill School. The vehicle is a 1967 Ford Ranch Wagon - topped by a ``bubble gum machine."

REFURBISHED

Photo: IAFF Local F-253
Engine 161 - Fort Myer - 1984 KME/2007 Pierce Dash

PUMPER BURNS

Photo: www.acfd3.com
On Jan. 16, 2009, a fire destroyed a reserve pumper housed at "The Hut" at the Arlington County Fire Training Academy on South Taylor Street.

INAUGURATION - 1953

Photo: www.steamlocomotive.com

On Jan. 15, 1953, the Arlington County Fire Department made one of its most dramatic mutual aid runs into Washington, D.C.

The Pennsylvania Railroad's "Federal Express" - packed people with headed to the nation's capital for the inauguration of President Eisenhower - crashed into Union Station after its brakes failed.

The District of Columbia Fire Department summoned assistance from Arlington County and other communities to help with the casualties.

Miraculously, there were no fatalities aboard the train or inside the terminal, which was evacuated moments before impact.

16 RESCUED

Photos: Channel 7

On Jan. 6, 2009, Arlington County firefighters rescued 16 people from the windows of a burning apartment building near Rosslyn. There were a number of injuries and several victims required hospitalization .

At least two others jumped, according to news reports, and witnesses said a child was dropped or passed from a window before firefighters arrived at the two-alarm blaze. Engine 103's crew carried an unconscious man from the building.

The fire, which was reported at 4:47 a.m., started in the basement storage room of the three-story building in the 1500-block of Fairfax Drive. Firefighters from Fort Myer and Fairfax County, as well as paramedics from the City of Alexandria, were also dispatched with the crews from Arlington County.

Battalion Chief Benjamin Barksdale, quoted by Channel 7, said residents ``couldn't make it down the main entrance - all the smoke from the basement had been pouring out into the stairwell. … There was no way they could have come down the stairs.''

The evening before, many of the same firefighters attended a two-alarm blaze that gutted a townhouse at 1180 North Vermont Street near Ballston.

OBAMA VISITS 301

Photo: Airport web site

On Nov. 10, 2008, President-Elect Barack Obama paid a mysterious visit to Fire Station No. 301 at Reagan National Airport in Arlington after calling on President Bush at the White House.

It later emerged Obama was at the airport authority's firehouse for a secret meeting with Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, who agreed to remain as defense secretary in Obama's cabinet.

``They pulled the trucks out so that our cars could go in,'' said Gates, quoted by the Los Angeles Times. The Pentagon, like the airport, is located in Arlington County.

According to ABC News:

``Outside of Fire Station 301, there were numerous Secret Service agents, and when Obama returned about an hour later to board his American Airlines jet bound for Chicago, whoever had been meeting with him slipped out a back gate. Now we know.''

Or as CNN noted:

``Washington is full of seemingly obscure places where history is made. Deep Throat's parking garage, the balcony at Ford's Theater. Now you can add the fire station at Reagan National Airport.''

BEAUTY & BEAST

Photo: Library of Congress

Circus performer Beatrice Kyle - in repose on wheel of steam fire engine at Fort Myer in Arlington - between acts at the Society Circus for the benefit of the Army Relief Fund on April 25, 1924. She is wearing a high driving outfit.

HURRICANE ISABEL - 2003

Photo: Washington Post

On Sept. 18-19, 2003, Hurricane Isabel downed trees and power lines across Arlington County and the rest of the Washington metropolitan area.

Arlington County firefighters rescued a man trapped in his bed by a falling tree on Military Road. Thousands of homes and businsses went without electrical service for days.

The county issued a press release on Sept. 19 that said: ``Initial assessments include two homes destroyed; 36 homes with major storm damage, 141 with minor storm damage; and 43 cars flattened.''

The Civil Air Patrol provided an aerial assessment of the damage.

Fire Station No. 7 in Fairlington provided drinking water to residents of the Alexandria, where water supplies had been contaminated by the hurricane.

BURIED ALIVE

On Oct. 28, 2008, a construction worker digging to reach a water line died when he was buried by a pile of dirt in the 800-block of North Greenbrier Street. Arlington County firefighters were assisted by firefighters from Fairfax County.

WOMAN, 84, DIES

Photo: Channel 7

On July 28, 2008, an apartment fire killed Lois Day, 84, on the seventh floor of 5535 Columbia Pike. The following units - from Arlington County and Fairfax County - responded to the mutual box: Engines 410, 101, 109, 102, Rescue 109, Truck 410, Tower 104, Medics 101 and 410, Battalion 111, EMS 111 and Safety 114, according to the web site of IAFF Local 2800.

MEDIC SHORTAGE

From Sun-Gazette
Sept. 9, 2008

A plan to augment Arlington County's seven emergency-medical services (EMS) ambulances with an eighth unit for peak times will have to wait until the government's budget situation improves.

Fire officials had hoped to bring the unit into service over the summer, but pulled back the idea due to “serious budget constraints,” Fire Chief James Schwartz said.

The proposed eighth unit, which would have operated weekdays when the system is most overloaded, was not included in the fiscal 2009 budget adopted by the County Board. But, given an increasingly high level of service calls, Schwartz earlier this year tried to find a way to add it.

“I tried to see if it was possible to create the additional unit with existing resources,” Schwartz told the Sun Gazette. “I ultimately determined that it wasn't possible.”

Schwartz cited increasing personnel costs, due to higher-than-anticipated turnover, for his decision to scrap the proposed eighth unit. He said he will wait until the fiscal 2010 budget process to request the new medic unit.

The extra unit has long been sought by some safety advocates and the Arlington Professional Firefighters and Paramedics Association, which represents many firefighters.

They point to “paramedic burnout” and the increasing number of times that the county government runs out of available medic units over the course of the year.

OLD NO. 8

Photo: Collection of Capt. Randy Higgins
Hall's Hill Volunteer Fire Department
Old Fire Station No. 8

The Hall's Hill Volunteer Fire Department protected Hall's Hill - a historic African-American neighborhood in the northern part of Arlington County.

Hall's Hill is ``situated on land that was an antebellum estate'' and ``a number of current residents are descended from the estate's slave families,'' according to the web site arlingtonarts.org. The residents of Hall's Hill ``endured the era of segregation and the struggle for civil rights,'' the web site said.

Until the early 1960s, the Arlington County Fire Department was also segregated and only black firefighters - paid and volunteer - were assigned to old Station No. 8.

The old station was replaced in 1963 by the current firehouse, which is located adjacent to the site of the old structure.

Read more about Hall's Hill and the book ``Up On The Hill" at:

http://www.arlingtonarts.org/cultural_affairs/uponthehill.htm

PORTRAIT OF ATTIC FIRE

Photo: IAFF Local 2800 web site
734 North George Mason Drive - July 5, 2008

HISTORY OF ENGINE 2

Old Wagon 2

Photos: acfd3.com and IAFF Local 2800 web site

21st Century: At 1130 N. Randolph St. on July 2, 2008

Arlington County Fire Station No. 2 - home of Engine 102, Medic 102 and EMS 112 - traces its roots to a volunteer fire company organized in 1904.

According to a history of the Ballston Volunteer Fire Department:

``The first registered agent of the BVFD was Mr. John Ball, a direct descendent of the John Ball who established a farm on land deeded to him by his cousin, George Washington. The farm was located near a crossroads which became known as Balls Crossroads.

``The BVFD first operated out of a garage belonging to one of the members, where the members would assemble when the bell was sounded, to pull the hand-pumped engine to a fire. The bell was located atop a pole alongside the trolley tracks at the intersection of Ballston Avenue and Fairfax Drive.

``In 1921 the permanent station was built on Ballston Avenue. When the County renamed streets and numbered houses the station address became 911 North Stuart Street.

``When Arlington County formally established the Arlington County Fire Department in 1940, the Ballston Fire Station was designated as Arlington County Fire Station No. 2.

``In 1976, the entire block where Fire Station 2 was located became the site for the new Glebe Road" Metro Rail station. At that time, only the BVFD and the Ballston Baptist Church still used the Ballston community name.

``The BVFD's negotiation with Metro and Arlington County provided for the construction of the new Fire Station 2 at 4805 Wilson Boulevard.

``In addition, the BVFD required the changing of the name of the Metro stop from Glebe Road Station to Ballston.''

FIREHOUSE BOND

Photo: http://www.scripophily.com/

In 1955, Arlington County issued bonds to finance the construction of fire stations.

Station No. 9, on South Walter Reed Drive, and Station No. 10, in Rosslyn, were the first stations actually owned and operated by the county government. The other stations were owned by volunteer companies.

Station No. 9 opened in 1957 and Station No. 10 opened in 1958.

Today, Station No. 3, in Cherrydale, is the last of the volunteer-owned firehouses in Arlington County.

'SALLY'

Photo: www.acfd3.com
The late Larry "Sally" Robey at the pump panel at a second alarm on South 8th Street in 1981. The 1977 GMC-Burco was part of a "two-piece" engine company - comprising a wagon and a pump - assigned to Station No. 9 on South Walter Reed Drive.

SMOKE SHOWING

Photo: www.acfd3.com
Exterior Attack
1944 Chevy-Oren at fire (circa 1960)

STRIKE UP THE BAND

VINYL FIREFIGHTERS: Arlington County's Old Engine 72 served as backdrop for the ``Fanning The Flames" album by the blue grass band Dry Branch Fire Squad. This scene is at Station No. 2 on Wilson Boulevard in the late 1970s or early 1980s.

HARD LUCK

Photos: WUSA Channel 9

Lightning struck twice for the Metropolitan Washington Airport Authority's fire department. In May 2008, Engine 327 caught fire during a pump test at the Fairfax County fire station in Chantilly. In October 2007, Rescue Engine 335 flipped over in Crystal City while responding to an alarm in the City of Alexandria.

TRUCK 1

TRUCK 1 - This photo was submitted by Tim Eisner whose father - Walter J. Eisner, pictured to the left - delivered this 1966 American La France aerial to the Arlington County Fire Department.

METRO TRAIN DERAILS

Medic Units at Court House
PHOTO: Channel 4 News

CLICK ON MAP FOR LARGER IMAGE

On June 9, 2008, the Arlington County Fire Department responded to a Metrorail derailment on the Orange Line between Rosslyn and Court House. The six-car train - No. 905 - was bound for Vienna when its third car left the tracks at about 2:45 p.m. There were no injuries among the 400 passengers. Passenger Nina Janopaul, 50, quoted by The Washington Post, said firefighters escorted passengers to a rescue train that backed into the tunnel.

BREAKFAST TO GO

On Feb. 26, 1954, diners abandoned their bacon and eggs just before a natural gas leak triggered an explosion and fire at a Cherrydale restaurant.

Newspaper accounts credited Arlington County firefighter Joe Fetzer - who was eating breakfast at the Rice Bowl Restaurant at 4032 Lee Highway - with evacuating the eatery.

A plumber raised a ladder to a second floor apartment, allowing two men and a woman to escape, according to a service station attendant who witnessed the explosion.

ALEXANDRIA - 1929

PHOTO: Alexandria Public Library

On Jan. 2, 1929, fire swept the Doniphan Building at 725 King Street in Alexandria's Old Town. Firefighters raised ladders and rescued residents.

The Washington Post said: ``Alexandria experienced its worst fire in years yesterday afternoon in the destruction of the Fairfax apartments, a four-story building at King and Columbus streets in the heart of the business district.''

Damage was estimated at $100,000.

It's likely the Town of Potomac - a section of Arlington County later annexed by the City of Alexandria - sent mutual aid as did Jefferson District, now known as Crystal City. The District of Columbia may have sent assistance, too.

The Potomac Fire Department was organized in 1924. It merged with the Alexandria Fire Department as a result of the annexation, and today its firehouse is the quarters of Alexandria Engine 202.

ABINGDON PLANTATION - 1930

On March 5, 1930, flames gutted Abingdon Plantation, birthplace of Nellie Custis, the mother of Martha Washington. ``The Jefferson District Fire Department responded to the alarm, but was unable to lend any aid owing to the lack of water,’’ a newspaper account said. The house - built in 1695 along the Four Mile Run - had been in disrepair. Today, a plaque marks the site, which is on the grounds of National Airport.

PHOTO: Alexandria Public Library

ODD FELLOWS - 1949

Aerial ladder in action

PHOTOS: www.acfd3.com

On April 14, 1949, flames raged in the two-story Odd Fellows Hall at Wilson Boulevard and Hudson Street, the heart of Clarendon’s business district. Firefighters saved the building, which still stands today.

The Washington Post called it ``Arlington’s worst fire in five years.’’ A merchant quoted by The Post estimated damage at $50,000.

The first alarm was sounded at 9:45 a.m. Second- and third-alarms followed. Offices on the second floor of the brick and masonry structure were gutted. On the ground floor, the Baby Fair Linen Shop and Mayer gift shop sustained smoke and water damage.

Firefighters advanced a hose line into the entrance to a beauty shop on the Hudson Street side of the building and also raised Truck 1’s aerial ladder on Wilson Boulevard to advance lines to the second floor. Ground ladders were also raised.

A police line was established across from the blaze, where spectators lined the sidewalk in front of the old Ashton Theatre, which was showing the movie ``Command Decision,’’ starring Walter Pidgeon and Clark Gable.

TAVERN FIRE - 1962

On July 28, 1962, three Arlington County firefighters were injured in a two-alarm fire at the Spot Tavern.

The midnight fire - the third in less than a month at the tavern - broke out in a basement men’s room of the two-story frame structure, which also housed an apartment and six rented rooms.

Ray Evans, then deputy chief of the Clarendon Volunteer Fire Department, was among those injured and was admitted to Arlington Hospital, according to The Washington Post. A roomer was also injured in the fire.

The Spot Tavern was located at 1200 North Fort Myer Drive.

PARKWAY SEARCH - 2008

PHOTO: Fox 5

On May 27, 2008, Arlington County firefighters recovered the body of a motorcyclist who swerved off a cliff on the George Washington Memorial Parkway about 12 hours earlier.

The body was hidden in brush along the Potomac River. The accident occurred north of Spout Run. A second and unrelated wreck nearby forced the closure of parkway.

HOTEL FIRE - 2008

On May 23, 2008, fire destroyed three buses parked at the Hilton Crystal City. Damage was estimated at $1.5 million. Battalion Chief Carol Saulnier of the Arlington County Fire Department attributed the cause of the fire to a diesel fuel leak, according to the Associated Press. About 150 guests were evacuated from the hotel at 2399 Jefferson Davis Highway.

PHOTO: Fox 5

NEW 911 CENTER

``When the Pentagon dials 911, Arlington County answers.''

In May 2o08, Arlington County opened a new Emergency Communications Center for the fire and police departments.

New digital radio system

Arlington is the first jurisdiction in the region to install a digital radio system that adheres to Project 25, a new national standard of public safety interoperability. The new system will enable Arlington’s first responders to better communicate with our regional partners. More 9-1-1 lines – Tripled the number of 9-1-1 lines from 16 to 48 to increase call capacity. Also includes dedicated lines for Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) calls.

­Digital Monitors

14 digital monitors enable ECC to monitor numerous video and data systems, including traffic and security cameras, mapping, and real-time status of utility outages; such inputs are essential for emergency management.

Enhanced emergency management

Arlington ECC is the first in the region to train all its ECC supervisors as sworn emergency managers.

Watch Desk

Monitors incidents and activate emergency protocols for events such as winter storms; major power outages; events with substantial first responder presence. Watch Desk Officers also activate the outdoor warning system and 1700AM Arlington emergency radio. Improved work conditions – Created a more comfortable environment to maximize productivity.

________________________________________________

• FIRE/EMS COMMUNICATIONS: 800 Mhz trunked

"FIREFIGHT" - BOOK REVIEW

UPDATED MAY 2008


___

Review by MICHAEL DOYLE, MODESTO (California) BEE

ARLINGTON, Va. - Remember the Pentagon.

It burned, too, dismembered by the same terrorists who brought down the twin towers of New York's World Trade Center. Circumstances, though, have rendered the Pentagon a Sept. 11 afterthought. It's the place that survived.

At the World Trade Center, 343 New York City firefighters died. At the Pentagon, every firefighter returned home. But not all came back safe and sound. The Arlington County Fire Department subsequently lost 9 percent of its force to health-related retirements.

But still.

The FDNY battalions marched into the World Trade Center and were entombed there. The Arlington crews subdued a different beast, smaller but still lethal, and in their victory they've remained largely anonymous.

Until now.

Six years on, the Arlington firefighters and their compatriots are getting the accounting they deserve.

In "Firefight: Inside the Battle to Save the Pentagon on 9/11," authors Patrick Creed and Rick Newman detail what happen- ed after American Airlines Flight 77 flew into the nation's military command center at 530 mph, killing 189 people, including the 64 people aboard the jet.

The plane hit at 9:37 a.m. It weighed 182,000 pounds, carried a bit less than 11,000 gallons of jet fuel and plowed forward, Creed and Newman write, "like a horizontal volcanic eruption." In eight-tenths of a second, the plane disintegrated. Six- hundred-thousand bolts and rivets blew out as shrapnel. The concussion rattled fire station doors nearly a mile away.

"What the (expletive) was that?" Arlington firefighter Derek Spector exclaimed.

"That was a (expletive) explosion," firefighter Brian Roche replied.

That's how firefighters talk. The way anyone talks when they have been hit in the gut.

Honest reporting prevails

There's a lot that can go awry in a big fire and rescue operation. Competing agencies can't communicate. Turf fights erupt.

Egos intrude. Honest reporting attends to these mishaps.

One example, recounted in "Firefight": An exhausted Arlington crew was resting in the Pentagon courtyard when several District of Columbia firefighters tried to steal the crew's air packs and face pieces.

About such perfidy, only one thing could be said.

"What the (expletive)?" Arlington fire Capt. Brian Spring shouted.

A lot, too, can go wrong in reporting such a story.

Misimpressions can coalesce into convenient anecdotes. The facts can grow soggy with sentiment. The fraternal order of those who were there fends off feelers from those who were not.

"Firefight" seems to get it right, as best I can tell.

Everything gets its proper measure. Mistakes happen, but steadfastness is the enduring virtue. At one point, an ailing firefighter sneaks behind an engine to vomit, knowing that if the medics see him, he'll be yanked off the biggest job of his career.

Technical competence is esteemed. When hulking Truck 105 couldn't fit through a Pentagon tunnel, officers cut the rear tiller cab off with an electric saw. The truncated vehicle squeezed through with two inches to spare.

Good management matters. By Sept. 21, incident commander Jim Schwartz, now the Arlington County fire chief, and his colleagues could relinquish control to the FBI. Arlington's deft crisis management is taught as a case study to Harvard Business School students.

Creed and Newman appear well-suited to capturing this story.

Creed is a volunteer firefighter and Army civil affairs officer.

He's obviously got heart. At one point, after Creed deployed to Iraq, he conducted one evening interview with an Arlington firefighter by satellite phone while his base was under mortar attack.

Newman is a reporter for U.S. News & World Report, a former Pentagon correspondent and the author of another book.

Faithful account of experiences

One of their Arlington sources is Capt. Joe Lightfoot, who once ran the fire station where I've ridden as a volunteer EMT since 2002. Hanging out in Station 2's kitchen, waiting for the emergency tones, Lightfoot and I have talked about, well, whatever: Iwo Jima, say, or Hillary Rodham Clinton's latest melodrama, or Led Zeppelin's personnel dynamics. In time, we also talked about the Pentagon. In every profane and poignant particular, Lightfoot's experiences as I heard them are faithfully recounted in "Firefight." So are many others.

Detail abounds here, and 486 pages may weigh down some readers. Inevitably, the drama that's white-hot at the beginning flags a bit by Day 8 or 9. It's a big story, though, and not just on the surface. It takes space to delve into an event so complicated. It takes space, too, to plumb the heart of a man; a man, say, such as Arlington Battalion Chief Bob Cornwell.

Cornwell fought in Vietnam a generation ago. Five months before Sept. 11, he had a tumor removed. His debilitating chemotherapy for non-Hodgkin's lymphoma was barely done when the Pentagon was hit. He easily could have checked out of the fight. Instead, he was running all over the building, weighed down by 45-plus pounds of turnout gear and air pack. When he finally was ordered to rest at the command post, he declined. He'd stay with his men, "Firefight" recounts.

"Doing good, Joey," Cornwell told Lightfoot, as the Pentagon burned and the firefighters worked. "Doing good."

Remember: Steadfastness is a virtue. "Firefight" gives it its due.

___


LINK TO FIRE JOURNAL REPORT ON PENTAGON ATTACK:
http://arlingtonfirejournal.blogspot.com/2005/03/attack-on-pentagon-sept-11-2001.html

`MICRO-QUAKE'

On May 6, 2008, a small earthquake - a ``micro-quake'' - rattled Northern Virginia. The magnitude 1.8 temblor was centered near Annandale. There were no reports of damage or injury, according to the Arlington County Office of Emergency Management. The time of the quake was 1:30 p.m. EDT. The last major earthquake centered in Virginia occurred more than a century ago - on May 31, 1897 in Giles County in the southwestern part of the state.

NOROVIRUS OUTBREAK

Medic 325
Photo: Airport web site

It was a busy night for the Reagan National Airport Fire Department.

On April 3, 2008, a norovirus infection sickened a dozen travelers with nausea as they headed home from a conference in Maryland. The airport fire department - with the assistance of Arlington County paramedics - treated the victims who were apparently infected at the conference.

According to the federal Centers for Disease Control:

``Noroviruses are a group of related, single-stranded RNA, nonenveloped viruses that cause acute gastroenteritis. ... People can become infected with the virus in several ways, including eating food or drinking liquids that are contaminated with norovirus; touching surfaces or objects contaminated with norovirus, and then placing their hand in their mouth; having direct contact with another person who is infected.''

DC RIOTS - 1968

40th Anniversary

In 1968, Washington, D.C. burned following the April 4 assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Memphis. Arlington County sent Wagons 2, 9 and 10, Engines 4 and 10, Truck 2 to aid the city's fire department. Disturbances broke out in sections of Arlington County as well.

Photo: Progressive Review

NEW STATION 5

STATION No. 5
Crystal City
1750 South Hayes Street
Arlington, VA 22202
Engine 105, Truck 105 & Medic 105

In 2008, the Arlington County Fire Department opened a new Station No. 5 in Crystal City - the latest in a series of firehouses to protect the community.

The original Company No. 5 was organized on Dec. 17, 1926, when the County Board of Alexandria County - as Arlington was then known - approved the charter of the Jefferson District Volunteer Fire Department.

The original company listed seven firefighters on its rolls and operated from a member’s garage at 206 Frazier Avenue - now 23rd Street South - in Aurora Hills.

In 1928, the volunteers opened a station at 101 Frazier Ave. (With the adoption of a new street naming scheme, the station was addressed 501 South 23rd St.)

During the early years, the members operated a hose wagon, a rescue squad and an ambulance.

In 1940, paid firefighters augmented the volunteers with the creation of the Arlington County Fire Department, and as time went on, the ACFD took over staffing of the engine company and ambulance.

In 1978, the original station was closed and firefighters moved to a station at 1750 South Hayes St., which is also the site of the new firehouse.

A monument stone from the original 1928 station - which was refurbished by Station 5 personnel - was placed at the new station, home of Engine 105, Truck 105 and Medic 105.

-Adapted from Arlington County Fire Department web site

HOUSE ENGULFED - 2008

UPDATED MAY 2008

PHOTO: Fire Lt. Jeff Kramer via http://www.acfd3.com/

Box 7602 - April 19, 2008 - 5:37 a.m.

``Units arrived with heavy fire showing from an old balloon frame single family home with extension to the `Delta' exposure,'' according to www.acfd3.com. ``A second alarm assignment and master stream devices brought the fire under control.''

RESCUE DOG `GUS'

Photo: U.S. Army

The Arlington County Fire Department received assistance from across the nation in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001 attack on the Pentagon.

Among those to answer the call to duty were rescue dog ``Gus'' - and his handler, Ed Apple of Tennessee Urban Search and Rescue Task Force No. 1.

SNAKE BITE

On March 24, 2008, Arlington County firefighters used a fire extinguisher to freeze a rattlesnake that bit Andrew Bacas, crew coach at Yorktown High School. Bacas, 49, was unpacking his duffel bag after a team trip to South Carolina. A 10-inch-long rattler had stowed away in the bag - and bit his right hand. According to The Washington Post: ``Using a 10-foot pole, rescue workers gingerly unzipped the duffel bag, just enough to slip in the nozzle of a carbon dioxide extinguisher.''

PAGE AIRWAYS - 1945

On April 27, 1945, a Page Airways passenger flight crashed at National Airport:

Washington, April 27 -- (AP) -- A transport plane en route from Miami, Fla. to Rochester, N. Y., crashed and burned in taking off at the national airport today killing two persons and injuring a number of others.

A civil aeronautics administration official said the plane, operated by Page Airways, was carrying 13 persons including the pilot and co-pilot.

Coroner's deputies identified the dead as:

MRS. J. WELLAN, of New York City.
RALPH WEISMAN, Forest Hills, Long Island.

Names of the injured were not immediately available.

An officer at the army dispensary at the airport said 11 persons were taken there for treatment.

Airport attaches said the plane was on a chartered flight and had stopped at the airport for fuel.

CITY OF ALEXANDRIA

Alexandria Fire Station No. 1 - Old Town

EDITOR'S NOTE: The Alexandria Fire Department participates in the Northern Virginia regional response plan and regularly answers alarms in Arlington County.

­Washington Examiner

The Alexandria Fire Department is critically short of staff and equipment and needs $5.5 million - which Alexandria is ill-equipped to spend - to bring it up to speed, a city-hired consultant has found.

City Manager James Hartmann hired consultant J. Gordon Routley in the wake of an August three-alarm fire at a high-rise condo building on Edsall Road in which three firefighters were hospitalized for smoke inhalation and dehydration and three more were injured.

"Alexandria's increasing population density, commercial activity, traffic and related factors are placing increasing demands on the fire department," Routhley wrote. "The fire department has innovated, reorganized and adapted to make the most efficient use of its resources. The resulting organization is very lean and its resources are stressed to meet normal day-to-day demands."

In February, the state cited the department for procedural failures, including that the first firefighters at Edsall Road fought the fire for one continuous hour instead of in 15-minute shifts as outlined in department procedures, "apparently due to staffing issues."

Routley, a fire investigation expert and former fire chief, details a laundry list of staffing, equipment and procedural issues that contributed to the injuries.

Most significantly, he noted a need for a minimum of four-person staffing on fire trucks instead of Alexandria's three-person minimum - an initiative Arlington County already has phased in. Fairfax and Prince William counties also are trying to add firefighters, but are suffering from budget woes.

Meeting the consultant's recommendation would require hiring 36 new firefighters and would cost the city more than $3 million.

Alexandria, as well as most jurisdictions in the area, is struggling to maintain its current programs in a tight budget year.

The Aug. 25, three-alarm fire at Edsall Road happened at the same time as two other multiple-alarm fires in the area, all of them sparked by thunderstorms.

The high number of incidents was one reason that the first firefighters to respond to the Edsall Road scene were not relieved by backup personnel quickly enough to avoid injury, but inadequate department communication also contributed, Routley said.

The department does not have a command vehicle - a $250,000 specialized vehicle equipped with radios, computers and meeting space.

"An environment that provides multiple radios, telephones, work stations with computer terminals, proper lighting and other enhancements is much more functional than standing at the rear of an SUV in a crowded parking lot," Routley said.

"It's a very sobering report," Vice Mayor Del Pepper said. "I had no idea that we had these needs - we knew some of these things, but certainly not the extent."

Mayor William Euille said the City Council will review the financial impact of the recommendations at April budget meetings.

MUTUAL AID TO DC

Photos: Channel 5, Channel 9

On March 13, 2008, the District of Columbia Fire Department requested mutual aid from Arlington County and other suburbs for a fire that swept an apartment building and church.

Firefighters encountered "heavy, heavy fire" at the general alarm in the Mt. Pleasant section of the city, D.C. Fire Chief Dennis Rubin said at a news conference.

FATAL HOUSE FIRE

Photos: Channel 7 WJLA web site

On March 7, 2008, a house fire killed an elderly woman in Arlington County and injured a firefighter. According to Channel 4, firefighters ``found the victim in her bed.'' The Washington Post reported the injured firefighter ``fell through the second floor of the structure while battling the blaze.''

Battalion Chief Carol Saulnier, quoted by the Post, said firefighters were called to the 5500 block of South 4th Street at 5:30 a.m. They found two people sitting outside the house with minor injuries who told them a third person was still inside. The elderly woman's body was recovered on the first floor of the dwelling. The firefighter's injuries weren't considered life-threatening.

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CIVIL WAR WEAPON FOUND

Old Arlington Hall

By David Shultz of The Connection newspaper

A PIECE of weaponry dating back to the Civil War was discovered underneath a local Arlington building late last month.

The weaponry consisted of an unexploded shell from the mid-1800’s. It was discovered on the evening of Jan. 31 underneath Arlington Hall which is located on Route 50 between Glebe Road and George Mason Drive.

Benjamin Barksdale, the Chief Fire Marshall for Arlington County, said that “They were doing some construction work and one of the construction people found it and called 911… You could clearly see it was a shell. It was one foot long, five inches in diameter. It looked like a large bullet.”

He said that County fire officials were unsure if the shell was live but, as a precautionary measure, the workers who were in the building above the shell were temporarily moved to another part of the building.

Because the shell was found on federal property, Barksdale said that bomb experts from Fort Belvoir were brought in to handle the shell.

The Arlington County Fire Department has handled buried munitions before, Barksdale said, but “Not like that… We’ve come across more modern day stuff. Every once in a while we’ll get a call that someone has got something from [the] Vietnam [era].”

KENNEDY GRAVE

On Nov. 28, 1982, tourists visiting Arlington National Cemetery discovered the charred body of a man at the grave of President John F. Kennedy - lying three feet from the eternal flame, The New York Times said. Police determined the man was intoxicated and had been trying to light a cigarette with a rolled newspaper.

ALARM SYSTEM

UPDATED MARCH 2008

Old bell at Station No. 4

Heart attacks from stress are a leading cause of firefighter deaths, so the Arlington County Fire Department has found a safer way to ease firefighters into emergencies - a soothing computer-generated voice over firehouse public address speakers.

Rather than the blast of an airhorn, a piercing radio tone or a bell jolting them into action, firefighters are alerted by a calm female voice - "Engine Company, structure fire" for example - followed by full details announced by a live 911 dispatcher.

Battalion Chief Ben Barksdale said the system has improved response times because firefighters aren't startled, according to Channel 5 News.

_____

Regarding the ``soothing alarm,'' a Fire Journal reader - who grew up in Ohio many years ago - writes:

``Even as a kid, my heart always took a jump when Columbus rang four quick blows on a bell - sharp and loud - over the radio as a prefix to a structural response.They changed it some years later to a tone, that was only slightly less terrifying.''

_____

Monday, March 10, 2008

By Daniela Deane - Washington Post Staff Writer

Jesus Escobedo is nodding off atop his Batman sheets when the little red lights flip on, casting a low light across his face. A woman's voice informs him gently, almost seductively, that it's time to get up. An alert is going out because an elderly nursing home patient is on the edge of death.

"Engine, medic, altered level of consciousness," the voice tells the Arlington County firefighter as he jumps out of his bed at the Ballston firehouse. In a matter of minutes, Escobedo is dressed and hurtling down Carlin Springs Road toward the nursing home.

"One minute you're sleeping, and the next minute you're going 50 miles an hour," said Escobedo, 27, sitting in the firetruck, sirens blaring, on his way to the 911 call last week. "And it can happen several times a night. It's a lot better when the waking up part is a little bit nicer."

A firefighter's job can be very stressful, involving long shifts, emotionally draining work and a response time measured in seconds, often many times a night. To reduce the cumulative stress on their 315 firefighters and paramedics, Arlington was one of the first jurisdictions in the Washington region to install kinder, gentler wake-up calls in its 10 firehouses.

"Before we put this in, fluorescent lights would snap on overhead, lighting up the whole place, and there would be this loud, shrill, rapid-fire beeping," said Capt. Randy Higgins, an Arlington firefighter for 24 years and Escobedo's shift supervisor. "You'd go from sound asleep to your heart beating wildly in your throat several times a night."

The consequences can be alarming.

Cardiac arrest -- not fighting fires -- is the leading cause of death among the estimated 300,000 full-time firefighters throughout the country, said Patrick Morrison of the International Association of Fire Fighters. Morrison, assistant in charge of education and training at the union, said that more than 50 firefighters die each year of heart attacks.

"The big thing we're seeing is that loud, sudden sounds give them a huge adrenaline dump," he said. "And the cumulative effect of that is contributing to early heart disease."

Morrison said studies have shown that heart rates more than double when firefighters, even the youngest, most fit ones, are roused by loud sounds and lights. Arlington is at the forefront of a national trend toward less jarring wake-up calls at firehouses, he said.

"When you go through that surge of adrenaline as many times as we do, it's worth making these kinds of investments in a system that diminishes that effect just a little bit," Arlington Fire Chief James Schwartz said.

Arlington installed its system in 2004, just six months after the city of Manassas Park. Since then, Prince William and Stafford counties have opted for the system, which is sold by several vendors.

Other local fire departments, including Fairfax, want to make the switch as they upgrade their facilities or their budgets allow it.

With the economic downturn, it is unclear when funds will be approved for the county to install the system in its 38 fire stations, Fairfax Battalion Chief Dean Cox said. "It's becoming the standard in the Metro area," he said.

Besides a healthier wake-up, the system has other advantages.

It's targeted, so it alerts only the crew needed on a specific call, not everyone in the firehouse. And the computer-activated system is faster, so it shaves important seconds off response time. The firefighters are usually already running toward their vehicles by the time they hear where they're going.

"It might save them 10 to 15 seconds," said Carol Saulnier, Arlington's chief fire marshal. "That might not seem like a lot, but it can really make the difference between life and death."

Arlington's average response time -- from the moment the dispatcher advises the firefighters to the time they get to their destination -- is four minutes, which is better than the national standard. Arlington firefighters and paramedics answered 24,215 emergency calls in 2007; Escobedo's station in Ballston took 5,565 of those calls.

Schwartz gets excited about another feature of the system: the ability of one jurisdiction to directly dispatch firefighters from another. That won't work until everyone is on the same page, though.

"Several times a day already, units from Fairfax run into Arlington to serve our citizens who dial 911 on the west end of Columbia Pike, since the closest unit to a good deal of that portion of Arlington is in Baileys Crossroads," said Schwartz. "When Fairfax comes online with the system, we will be able to alert them from our own dispatch center, which could cut up to a couple minutes off our response time."

Schwartz said that "response time is everything" in the emergency services business. "If you're in cardiac arrest, you need CPR within four minutes," he said.

A few decades ago, volunteer firefighters in many rural communities across the country would be roused from beds in their own homes by loud wailing sirens that would wake up the whole area.

Then came the night-watch method of alert, where firefighters would take turns staying up to answer a dispatcher's call on the phone and then wake up the rest of the team. Or one firefighter would sleep next to the phone and have the responsibility of answering it and waking everyone up. After that, the radio-based system with the loud, shrill beep-beep prevailed.

Still, in some fire departments in the country, every time there's a call, every fire station in the area gets notified, according to the IAFF.

Escobedo, who's only worked with the new system, admits he's got the sultry woman's voice turned up as high as it goes. He said he tends to be a heavy sleeper.

Is there any worry that it's all just a little too gentle?

"Nah," said Higgins. "There's a lot of peer pressure to get up quickly in this job. You don't want to be the guy who slept through the alarm. You get called Rip Van Winkle and stuff like that. You never live it down."

TRAINING

Photo: acfd3.com
Training at National Airport - 2007

Vintage photo of drill tower - 1950s

MR. LEROY

Harold LeRoy, long-time president of the Arlington County Fire and Rescue Association, died Jan. 22, 2008. He would have celebrated his 91st birthday on Feb. 1.

Firefighters - both career and volunteer - addressed him as "Mr. LeRoy'' as a sign of respect. He remained active with the volunteer association, the fire department historical society and the ``Chowder Club'' until his passing.

Mr. LeRoy joined the Jefferson District Volunteer Fire Department in the late 1930s, and during the manpower shortages of World War II was sworn in as a member of the Arlington County Fire Department - though he never collected a paycheck.

He was preceded in death by his wife, Beth.

Mr. LeRoy, who also served as chief of the Jefferson District VFD when he was younger, enjoyed sharing stories of his career, including his many runs on old Squad 5.

Recalling the 1959 general alarm at the Pentagon, LeRoy said one image that remained with him into old age was that of a paid firefighter, Eddie Dodson, emerging from the smoke-charged basement of the massive building covered in soot. ``He sat down on the running board of the wagon – and promptly lit a cigarette,’’ LeRoy chuckled.

`MURPH' THE FIRE DOG

Modern fire dog

Many years ago, Murph - "The Fire Engine Dog" - resided at Old Station No. 2 in Ballston, and we are told that when the bells went off, Murph was the first one to hop on the wagon - even before the firemen.

After one fire call, Murph climbed on the wrong engine and went back to another firehouse. The firemen at the other station knew him, though, and phoned No. 2. ``We have Murph. Come and get him," they said.

There are no active canines in Arlington County firehouses as of this writing.

HIGH-RISE FIRE - 2008

UPDATED FEBRUARY 2008

Photo: Station 28 web site

Photo: Fox 5

A three-alarm fire erupted in a 12-story apartment building in Seven Corners on Jan. 12, 2008. More than 100 Fairfax County and Arlington County firefighters raced to the blaze triggered by a natural gas explosion. The alarm went out as a seemingly routine medical local for Engine 428.

According to The Washington Post: ``The initial call came in at 7:52 a.m. as a suicide attempt at the Cavalier Club Apartment on Wilson Boulevard. But when rescuers arrived, they found a natural gas leak that led to an explosion in a second floor apartment.''

The Fairfax County Fire Department said in a press release: "Firefighters encountered heavy smoke and fire in Apartment 211 (and) brought the fire under control in approximately 15 minutes."

Mark Williams, 39, a resident who suffered severe burns, died at the Washington Burn Center on Jan. 13. Five people, including three police officers who assisted with the rescue, were treated for smoke inhalation.

FIRE JOURNAL

UPDATED APRIL 2008

Photo from Station 4 web site

Photo from Station 9 web site

"See you on the big one.'' - Firehouse salutation

Welcome to the ARLINGTON FIRE JOURNAL - an online history book. The fire and rescue service in Arlington County, Virginia, has a storied history, from the first volunteers to today's career Arlington County Fire Department, as well as the fire departments at Fort Myer and National Airport and the volunteers' Arlington County Fire & Rescue Association.

TOTAL FIRE & EMS RUNS FOR 2007 - 44,115

FIRST DUE ON 9/11/01: The Arlington County Fire Department was "first due" at the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001. Read about the response in the article entitled "ATTACK ON THE PENTAGON." Other articles recount the hiring of the nation's first female firefighter in 1974, the Air Florida crash in 1982, a tragic school bus accident in April 2005 - and much more.

The ARLINGTON FIRE JOURNAL - written and edited by Vinny Del Giudice - is dedicated to the memory of retired Battlion Chief Robert ``Cuz'' Carpenter and retired Battalion Chief James ``Jimmie'' Fought, founding members of the Arlington County Fire Department Historical Society.

E-MAIL - wb2kqg@arrl.net

VISIT OUR RELATED SITES

http://londonfirejournal.blogspot.com

http://springfieldfirejournal.blogspot.com

OFFICIAL FIRE DEPT. WEB SITE

http://www.arlingtonva.us/Departments/Fire/FireMain.aspx

TRUCK COMPANIES

From Collection of Arlington Fire Capt. Randy Higgins

ENGINE 66

Engine 66, staffed by federal firefighters, protected the old Arlington Hall Station of the U.S. Army until base closed in 1990.

The two-piece engine company, which consisted of a wagon and a pumper, covered Box 6672 - and rarely left the post. It was a quiet station. Very quiet.

Today, the site - at Route 50 and George Mason Drive - is occupied by the State Department training center and the National Guard.

This photo of Engine 66's wagon is from the collection of Arlington Fire Capt. Randy Higgins. The rig - a 1980 Hahn/Firetec 1000/500/30 - was transferred to the Fort Belvoir Fire Department in Fairfax County, according to Higgins.

APPARATUS ROSTER

Engine 103 and Rescue 104
(Photo courtesy of www.acfd3.com)

Station No. 1 - Engine 101, Medic 101, Hazmat 101, Battalion 111
Station No. 2 - Engine 102, Medic 102, EMS 112, Mobile Command
Station No. 3 - Engine 103
Station No. 4 - Rescue 104, Truck 104, Medic 104, Battalion 112, Safety 114
Station No. 5 - Engine 105, Truck 105, Medic 105
Station No. 6 - Engine 106, Truck 106, Medic 106, Ambulance 106, Utility 106, Canteen 106, Light & Air 103
Station No. 7 - Engine 107
Station No. 8 - Engine 108, Medic 108, Air 108
Station No. 9 - Engine 109, Rescue 109, Medic 109, EMS 111
Station No. 10 - Engine 110, Medic 110, TRT 110
Station No. 61 - Rescue Engine 161, Rescue Engine 162
Pentagon Heliport - ARFF
National Airport - Rescue Engine 335, Medic 325, ARFF

BUS FIRE

ADDED FEBRUARY 2008

On June 7, 2007, fire destroyed an Arlington Transit ART bus as it was making a night-time run.

According to an official Arlington County press release:

``The fire broke out at about 7:40 p.m. on an ART bus making the final northbound run on ART Bus Route 75, as the bus entered the intersection of South Carlin Springs Road and 6th Street. All three passengers aboard and the driver evacuated without injury.

``The bus driver told Arlington County Fire Department officials that he saw smoke coming from rear wheels and pulled over in front of 601 Carlin Springs Road. Flames quickly engulfed the bus, and damaged cable and power lines directly overhead. The utilities were shut down to avoid any injuries on scene, causing some temporary cable and power outages.''

COLD WAR CLASSIC

Arlington County operated CD Rescue unit in 1950s
(Photo courtesy of www.civildefensemuseum.com)

A LETTER FROM PATTON

OFFICE OF THE COMMANDING OFFICER
FORT MYER, VIRGINIA

March 1, 1934

Fire Chief,
Clarendon Fire Department,
Clarendon, Virginia

Dear Sir:

On behalf of the officers and men garrisoned at Fort Myer I desire to thank you and your men for the prompt and effective manner in which you participated in fighting the fire in the Riding Hall at this station on the night of February 28th-March 1st.

Your assistance was invaluable and it is felt, but for your efforts, the fire might and probably would have spread to other buildings, possibly endangering the very existence of Fort Myer.

Again assuring you of our deep appreciation, I am

Most sincerely yours,

G. B. PATTON, Jr.
Major, 3d Cavalary
Commanding

________________________________________

Transcript of letter courtesy of Betty Fought

________________________________________

Comment from Senior Station Officer Ian Munro, Metropolitan Fire and Emergency Services Board, Melbourne, Australia:

"Back then he would have been `George Who ??' And what would have happened if he had lost Fort Myer? Would he have made it to General? And would it have affected the army capacity in later years?
One for the `Alternate History` writers to `what if` about."

IN REMEMBRANCE

Graves of Sept. 11 victims at Arlington National Cemetery

DEADLIEST FIRES IN ARLINGTON COUNTY HISTORY

• Pentagon - Sept 11, 2001 ... 189 victims


• Park Warren Apartments - Nov. 15, 1996 ... 4 victims


• Rooming house, Ballston - Nov. 14, 1986 ... 3 victims


• House, South Arlington - Dec. 1944 ... 3 victims

ASSORTED PHOTOS

WRECKAGE OF FOAM 161 - PENTAGON 9/11/01

HOLLINGER BOX COMPANY - 1950s

OLD RADIO ROOM - STATION 4

OLD SQUAD 5

THROUGH THE YEARS

FOR HISTORICAL 'RUNS & WORKERS'
CLICK ON FIRE ALARM BOX

Updated May 15, 2007

REFINERY FIRE - 1924: Fire broke out at the Crown Oil and Wax Company in Rosslyn on Aug. 6, 1924 - and threatened nearby petroleum storage tanks. The District of Columbia Fire Department assisted Arlington's volunteer companies. The fire was ignited by ``a short-circuit in wires connecting the pumps,'' according to The Washington Post.

DISPUTE OVER MUTUAL AID - 1924: ``Chief Jack A. Spates of the Cherrydale fire department, answering charges made by J.M. Duncan, assistant chief of the Alexandria department, last night denied any property was in danger as the result of the fire Monday, which destroyed the home of William Sothern in Jefferson district, when he refused Duncan's request for use of the Cherrydale hose.'' - The Washington Post, Nov. 19, 1924

CHRISTMAS TRAGEDY - 1934: Two children perished in a house fire in Arlington County on Dec. 23, 1934. The fire occurred ``in a detached two-story frame house'' on Malvern Place in Thrifton Village, according to The Washington Post. The children were home alone on the second floor of the dwelling. Malvern Place no longer exists. Thrifton Village is believed to have been the name of a neighborhood near Cherrydale, Maywood and Woodmont.

ROSSLYN EXPLOSION - 1945: The Dec. 10, 1945 edition of The Washington Post reported: ``The early-Sunday quiet of Rosslyn, Va., was spectacularly broken yesterday when a 5000-gallon runaway truck-trailer loaded with high test gasoline crashed into a parked milk truck and exploded.''

FIREMEN OVERCOME - 1952: On July 4, 1952, six firefighters were injured at a blaze at the Drug Fair store at 4821 Columbia Pike. Five of the men suffered smoke inhalation, The Washington Post said. About a week earlier, June 26, 1952, dozens of firemen were overcome by smoke and heat at a fire at the Noland Co. warehouse in Rosslyn.

DAMAGE TO STATION NO. 7 - 1954: ``The four-ton pumper housed in the Fairlington firehouse has been moved out after two cracks appeared in the concrete floor,'' according to the Oct. 9, 1954 edition of The Washington Post.

AIR FLORIDA - 25 YEARS

Jan. 13, 2007 - the 25th anniversary of crash of Air Florida Flight 90 into the 14th Street Bridge
CLICK ON PHOTO FOR FIRE JOURNAL'S FLIGHT 90 REPORT

HIGH-RISE RESCUE

(Photos from ACFD and The Washington Post)

A concrete slab collapsed Dec. 8 on the 24th floor of a high-rise building under construction in the Rosslyn district of Arlington County, trapping three workers and injuring a dozen more.

Arlington County firefighters - along with fire crews from the Fort Myer military post, the City of Alexandria and Fairfax County - treated the casualties. A surgical team from George Washington University Hospital also responded. The size of the alarm assignment was the equivalent of a general alarm fire.

The incident - at 1901 North Lynn St. - recalled high-rise construction accidents at job sites in Crystal City in 1968 and Bailey's Crossroads in 1974.

Construction worker Oscar Moscoso, who was on the roof of the high-rise, told reporters that a scaffold failed - triggering the collapse of wet concrete at about 8:30 a.m. Workers - who had planned a "topping-out" party later in the day - used their hands and shovels to reach the injured before firefighters and paramedics arrived.

Arlington County Fire Captain Tom Polera said an approximately 60 x 30 foot area of the roof collapsed onto the 24th, or top floor, of the building about 2 1/2 hours after workers began pouring concrete, according to The Washington Post.

During the rescue, a firefighter suffered a back injury.

Battalion Chief Scott McKay - Battalion 112 - was the incident commander.

Units assigned to the alarm, according to ACFD3.COM:

Engines: 102, 103, 105, 106, 108, 110, 161, 202

Trucks: 104, 208

Rescues: 104, 109, 206

Medics: 101, 102, 104, 105, 106, 109, 110, 202, 205, 208, 401, 418

Also: Command Unit, Hazmat 101, TRT 110, Hazmat 202, Mass Casualty Unit, Battalion 111, 112, FM 114, EMS Chief, Services Chief.

The Falls Church volunteers sent their canteen unit, Canteen 106.

WILLARD HOTEL FIRE - 1922

Over the years, the Arlington County Fire Department has answered mutual aid requests from the District of Columbia Fire Department for fires, explosions, riots, a train wreck and other emergencies. The following tale - based on a speech by former President Gerald Ford - shows almost anything can happen on a run to the nation's capital. (To be sure, it's not known whether any Virginia fire companies attended this particular incident.)

In 1922, a general alarm fire broke out in the ballroom atop the Willard Hotel in downtown Washington, and firefighters evacuated the guests - including then Vice President Calvin Coolidge. As the time passed, Coolidge grew tired of waiting in the street and decided to return to his hotel room.

As he headed for the stairs, a fireman demanded identification.

"I am the Vice President," Coolidge said.

The fireman asked: "Vice President of what?"

"Vice President of the United States," Coolidge said.

"Then get back here," the fireman said. "I thought you were Vice President of the hotel."

FIRE AND FLOOD - 2006

Falls Church warehouse fire
(Photo courtesy of http://www.acfd3.com/)

The Arlington County Fire Department contended with fire and flood in late June and early July 2006.

Firefighters employed master streams to extinguish a three-alarm warehouse fire in the 2000-block of North Westmoreland Street - just across from Station No. 6 in Falls Church - on July 15.

``Engine 106 arrived to find heavy fire blowing out of the Adam and Baker sides of a vacant one-story 75' X 150' former moving and storage warehouse,'' according to Capt. Randy Higgins on acfd3.com. ``The second and third alarms were quickly sounded bringing virtually the entire on duty crews from Arlington and over 11 units from Fairfax County.''

Just over a week earlier, on June 30, firefighters tackled a two-alarm fire in a high-rise at 4250 North Fairfax Drive in Ballston - an alarm that initially came in as a medical emergency.

Instead of a patient, a building engineer greeted Engine 102 and Medic 102 and ``advised them of sparks coming from an electric panel in the main electric vault on the P-1 level,'' according to Higgins. ``Engine 102 called for the box to be filled ... and then proceeded to the fire control room where multiple devices on multiple floors were lighting up the panel! ''

Office workers on the 13th floor reported water pouring from the ceiling, and firefighters sent to the floor above - No. 14 - discovered heavy smoke and fire, which was promptly entinguished, according to Higgins.

Firefighters also answered hundreds of calls during the worst rain in more than 100 years of record keeping in late June.

The Arlington County Emergency Communications Center dispatched more than 580 service calls to police and fire units between 9 p.m. on June 25 and and 11 a.m. the next day, according to the county government web site.

Career and volunteer firefighters activated additional units to respond to all the alarms.

APPARATUS GALLERY

Foam 161 - Pentagon Heliport & Fort Myer

Foam 326 - Reagan National Airport

"Christine" - Old Reserve Truck

No. 3's "wagon" in Rosslyn

Old Wagon 9 and other apparatus

Old Truck 3

Old Falls Church firehouse

Light Unit & Utility 73 - Iwo Jima Memorial (1990)

Truck 106 on the job

Rescue Engine 324 - Reagan National Airport

Engine 3 - Cherrydale firehouse

Engine 3 refurbished as foam wagon

Quints 104 & 109

Old Engine 61 - U.S. Army Fort Myer

MEDSTAR CHOPPER CRASHES

Medstar service at Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001

A Medstar helicopter that serves Arlington County and the rest of the metropolitan area crashed May 30, 2006, as it approached the Washington Hospital Center in the District of Columbia.

The medevac patient - already in grave condition - died hours later in surgery. The crash injured Medstar's three crew members.

According to The Washington Post, the Eurocopter - on a flight from Greater Southeast Community Hospital - plummeted onto a golf course on the grounds of the Armed Forces Retirement Home on North Capitol Street, Northwest, at about 5 p.m.

The pilot had transmitted a distress call.

"I could see [the helicopter] laboring," witness Jay Speights, who was getting out of his car at the golf course parking lot, told the Post.

According to a 2005 report on the Washington Hospital Center's web site, the helicopter service - which is operated by the hospital center - carried more than 36,000 patients ``with a perfect safety record since its inception in 1983.''

The Medstar service evacuated casualties from the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001.

The fleet consists of three EC-135 choppers, which have a cruising speed of 150 mph and a range of approximately 250 miles, according to the Medstar Transport web site. The standard flight crew consists of a pilot, critical care nurse and a critical care paramedic.

2-ALARM CHURCH FIRE

By Captain Charles A. Gibbs
Arlington County Fire Department

On 24 May 2006, at 1058 hours Box 4603 was struck for a structure fire at 103 West Columbia Street, Columbia Baptist Church (Falls Church). This church is a large complex consisting of several different interconnected buildings fronting on four streets. The church houses and hosts quite a few ministries including 250 pre-school children. The fire was in a storage area above the pulpit area of the main sanctuary.

EMS 112 arrived on the scene within three minutes reporting smoke showing from the eves on the W. Jefferson Street side. He designated this side Adam and established command. He quickly called for a second alarm. Engine 106 arrived and stretched a handline to the second floor through a doorway on the Baker side, quadrant Adam. Truck 106 took a position on side David. They positioned the aerial to the roof and raised numerous ground ladders on side David and Baker. The crew proceeded inside to assist Engine 106. Engine 102 reversed laid a supply line for Engine 106 and the crew advanced the backup line from Engine 106 to the second floor.

Engine 418 (Fairfax County) established a secondary water supply in the parking lot across the street from the church. The crew proceeded to the second floor. Rescue 418 proceeded to the second floor to assist with extinguishment and checking extension. Engine 103 established the RIT side Adam at Engine 106. They surveyed all sides checking ground ladder placement.

Battalion Fire Chief 112, Blankenship, established the command post at the buggy across the street from side Adam. Truck 104 positioned on Side Charlie, raised the aerial to the roof and assisted with ventilation. BFC 111 was designated the interior division. Medic 102 established an aid station on the Adam side and later established the rehab division. Units on the interior had no difficulty locating and extinguishing the fire. The fire was knocked down in ten minutes and completely out in twenty minutes. There was no extension above the fire room.

The second alarm units were ordered to report to command on arrival. Engine and Truck 410 relieved Engine 106, Engine 102 and Truck 106 on the second floor. I do not know the other companies assignments.

The fire was in an area above the pulpit in a 15’ X 15’ concrete room. It was used for storage. The all concrete construction held the heat for quite awhile but it did not present any problems. The location of the fire room allowed for fairly quick smoke removal from the fire area but unfortunately it dissipated into the sanctuary.

As is found in a lot of churches the sanctuary was approximately 50’ high and proved challenging for smoke removal. Smoke removal was accomplished by strategically placing several positive pressure fans. There was some minor smoke travel in other areas of the church that mostly dissipated on its own. Fairly late in the operation a crew from 418 went to the roof to check for extension.

All building occupants including the 250 children self evacuated and were accounted for very early on in the incident. It must be stated that for the teachers to control and account for 250 children is a testament to their responsibilities. They maintained control of the children without incident.

Courtesy www.acfd3.com

'GALLANT FOX 06' - PENTAGON

The Arlington County Fire Department participated in a bio-terrorism exercise at the Pentagon on May 17.

The Defense Department issued the following account of the drill, written by Army Sergeant Sara Wood of the American Forces Press Service:

The Pentagon Force Protection Agency, Arlington County Fire Department, Red Cross, and other local and federal agencies participated in the exercise, dubbed "Gallant Fox 06," based on a scenario involving a suspected anthrax attack inside the Pentagon that triggered a sensor. In the scenario, testing was done and the presence of anthrax was confirmed.

Sixty-two Red Cross volunteers played the roles of affected Pentagon employees. They were evacuated out of the Pentagon to a decontamination site in the building's north parking lot. There they removed their "contaminated" clothing, took showers to rid themselves of any anthrax spores, and were given antibiotics to prevent infection. Some players also simulated special situations, like symptoms of anthrax infection or people with disabilities who needed assistance.

The exercise was a success, but the agencies did identify some areas where improvement is needed, said Arlington County Fire Chief Jim Schwartz. The decontamination of potentially contaminated people poses a challenge, he said, because right now the procedures are for people to remove their clothes outside, shower in a trailer, and come back outside.

"You can imagine what kind of circumstances we would be facing if this were a day in mid-winter, trying to do the kinds of things that we were doing," he said.

FIRE STATIONS

Station 1 - Glebe Road

Station 2 - Ballston

Station 3 - Cherrydale VFD

Station 4 - Clarendon (Special Services)

Station 5 - Crystal City

Station 6 - Falls Church

Station 7 - Fairlington

Station 8 - Hall's Hill

Station 9 - Walter Reed Drive

Station 10 - Rosslyn

Station 61 - U.S. Army Fort Myer

Pentagon Heliport

Reagan National Airport

LIGHT & AIR 103

FROM THE WATCH DESK

(Photo courtesy www.acfd3.com)

SAFETY YELLOW - Robert Groshon, during his tenure as chief of department in the 1970s, advocated the use of ``safety yellow'' for the county's fire apparatus, replacing the traditional red. Yellow it remained into the 1990s, when a white with a yellow safety stripe scheme was adopted. Today, the fleet is again red.

RESCUE 104 & 109 - ``The rescues went in service January 1997 in `single pull status' (both #4 and #9 housed a truck and a rescue staffed by a single crew - call type determined which unit the crew took to the incident). The quint units were built in 1998, and placed in service during the fall of the same year. On the same day, Quints #4 and #9 were placed in service, E104 and E109 were placed into reserve status along with T104 and T109.'' - Battalion Chief Robert Gray

THE MYSTERY OF TRUCK 71 - When Fire Station No. 1 moved to its new quarters on South Glebe Road in the early 1990s, the lettering on the station identified it as the home of both Engine 71 and Truck 71. As it turned out, a full-time Truck 71 was never placed in service, and instead a reserve ladder - AKA ``Christine'' - was briefly parked in the apparatus bay. The lettering, however, remained in place for 15 years. (The station is now home to Engine 101, Medic 101, Hazmat 101 and Battalion 111. EMS 111 moved to Station No. 9. - Thanks to Lt. Nick Salameh of Engine 101)

THE NICKEL- Retired Capt. Stan Bowen reports that the firefighters at old Station No. 5 ``helped me decide that fire and rescue work would be an exciting and noble career after my stint in the Navy.'' Back in 1965, ``The Nickel'' ran less than 300 calls annually, according to Bowen, who retired after 31+ years as a career firefighter and is also a former member of Jefferson District VFD #5. Today, Station No. 5 - Crystal City - is a busy house!

OLD TRUCK 78 - ``In the early 80's Arlington disposed of three American LaFrance tiller trucks at auction. One of the trucks sold was a combination of Truck 74's 1965 tractor and Truck 78's 1963 trailer. The rig was purchased by the Paxtonia VFD located near Harrisburg, PA. The ladder truck ran for many years as Truck 34-1 in Paxtonia before allegedly being sold to a collector in Michigan. ... Thanks to ACFD Firefighter Ralph Parsons (and Paxtonia VFD member) for the information.'' - www.acfd3.com

(If anyone knows the whereabouts of Old Truck 78, please contact Capt. Randy Higgins at Station No. 3)

BUSY MONTH - JANUARY 2006

$200,000 FIRE AT PENTAGON

Box 7560 - Pentagon
(Photo courtesy www.acfd3.com)

On Jan. 19, 2006, a three-alarm fire caused $200,000 damage at the Pentagon. The fire broke out in a kitchen on the third floor of the building and flames traveled to the roof.

FIREFIGHTERS SAVE CHURCH

Arlington County and Fairfax County firefighters battled a two-alarm fire at the Falls Church Presbyterian Church on Jan. 28, 2006 - and saved a part of our local history.

``The blaze started about 11 a.m. in an outdoor trash can and spread into the building on East Broad Street, causing fire and water damage to ceilings, the choir room and administrative offices,'' The Washington Post reported.

Arlington County ECC (Emergency Communications Center) received multiple 911 calls and Battalion 112 radioed ``heavy smoke showing'' as he arrived on the scene.

According to the web site http://www.acfd3.com/ -``Units stretched lines to the second floor and attic area and made an impressive attack on the fire. The fire originated on the exterior and entered the huge stand-up attic via the soffit vents. An aggressive interior attack by the first alarm units saved this historic building from destruction.''

In his 1972 text "Fireground Tactics," Emanuel Fried wrote: ``Fires in old churches are extremely difficult to fight and constitute unusual dangers to operating forces. Once seriously involved, a church fire generally continues until the church is destroyed.''

FIRST ALARM
Engines 106, 428, 418, 102 Truck 106, Tower 104, Rescue 418, Medic 106, Battalions 112, 404, EMS 112, FM 114

SECOND ALARM
Engines 108, 103, 410, 413, Tower 401, Medic 418, 102, Light and Air 103, Battalion 111. The volunteers of Canteen 106 also assisted.

CIA SHOOTING - 1993

Court hearing
(Sketch from CNN)

On Jan. 25, 1993, a gunman named Mir Amal Kansi killed two people and injured three others outside CIA Headquarters at Langley in Fairfax County, Virginia.

The Arlington County Fire Department responded on the ``mutual box'' and helped Fairfax County paramedics and firefighters treat the casualties.

Fire/EMS Captain Miguel Serra recently shared the following with the Arlington Fire Journal:

''I looked through the 'blog' ... and there is one incident of national significance, to which some of the ACFD units responded which is not mentioned. I don't remember the exact date, but in the winter of 1992/3 (I think) Medic 106 ("A" Platoon, Mark Girard and Clayton Deskins) and EMS 72 (Miguel Serra) responded to the CIA building in Langley, Virginia to assist Fairfax County units with multiple shooting victims. (This may very well have been the first ``Islamic terrorist'' attack on U.S. soil ... It was before the 1993 Trade Center bombing.) Medic 106 treated and transported one of the survivors to Fairfax Hospital. EMS 72 assisted Medic 106 and other units on the scene.''

Kamil fled the county and was arrested four years later in Pakistan.

A statement issued by the CIA and FBI on June 17, 1997 said:

``FBI Deputy Director William J. Esposito and Acting Director of Central Intelligence George J. Tenet today announced the apprehension of Mir Amal Kansi, an FBI Top Ten Fugitive and the suspected gunman in the January 25, 1993, attack outside Central Intelligence Agency headquarters which killed two CIA employees and wounded three others. Kansi has been delivered abroad by Afghan individuals to the custody of United States authorities. He has been transported to the United States where he will face trial in Fairfax, Virginia. ''

Kansi was convicted and executed by the Commonwealth of Virginia.

CHIEF FOUGHT 1914-2005

Chief Fought

Retired Battalion Chief James ``Jimmie'' Fought of the Arlington County Fire Department, a founder of the Arlington County Fire Department Historical Society, died at his home in Arlington, Virginia, on Dec. 16, 2005. He was 91.

The chief was a member of a firefighting family. His father served as a sergeant with the District of Columbia Fire Department, and his late son served as a captain in the Arlington County Fire Department.

Fought's career as a firefighter started as a volunteer in the 1930s with the Falls Church Volunteer Fire Department and later the Clarendon Volunteer Fire Department.

The county hired Fought as a full-time paid firefighter in 1943 and he advanced through the ranks to become one of the county's first battalion chiefs in 1956.

He spent his career ``on the road'' as he liked to say, supervising fire and rescue operations.

``The fire won't wait for you!'' the quintessential chief would tell his firefighters.

Major Fires

Fought helped supervise firefighting operations at a general-alarm fire in the basement of the Pentagon on July 2, 1959. That fire was listed as among the nation's worst in a book published by the National Fire Protection Association in 1976 to commemorate the bicentennial. A number of firefighters were injured at the 1959 Pentagon fire.

He also supervised the daring rope rescue of a 12-year-old boy who fell into a deep well at a construction site in Rosslyn on June 11, 1959.

Earlier as a fire captain, Fought was in charge of the county's old ``Squad 5’’ that responded to a pair of disasters in Washington on Jan. 15, 1953 - ``Black Thursday'' - the day a runaway Pennsylvania Railroad train plowed into the concourse at Union Station, and a later unrelated explosion at the Standard Tire and Battery Store in Northeast Washington that injured a number of D.C. firemen.

He was also among Arlington firefighters sent to the district for the riots in April 1968.

Active Retirement

Fought, a member of the International Association of Firefighters Local 2800 in Arlington, retired in 1972.

He remained active in firefighting circles until his death and co-founded the Arlington County Fire Department Historical Society with the late Robert ``Cuz'' Carpenter, also a retired battalion chief, in the 1990s.

The chief helped with the compilation of the historical society's ``Red Book,'' a history of the fire and rescue service in Arlington County. He also contributed to the ``Arlington Fire Journal’’ newsletter.

Fought was also an active member of ``The Chowder Club'' and ``The Lunch Bunch'' - social clubs for retired members of the fire department.

HAZMAT TEAM

HAZMAT 101

HIGHLIGHTS - 2005

COMMAND UNIT PLACED IN SERVICE

On Dec. 21, 2005, the Arlington County Fire Department placed its new Mobile Command Unit in service at Fire Station No. 2 in Ballston. The a 40-foot vehicle is outfitted with state-of-the-art communications equipment, a satellite dish and many other features.

The MCU - purchased with funds provided through the U.S. Justice Department, ``is a critical tool for the fire department during major incidents like 9-11.'' Arlington County Fire Department Chief Jim Schwartz said.

Among the MCU's features are seven workstations, a high resolution mast-top camera, a 1.2-meter satellite antenna, an integrated telephone system with fax capability, a radio system covering the entire Washington area, two slide-out rooms with a 350-horsepower turbocharged diesel engine, a conference room and galley, a 35-kilowatt Power Take-Off generator and a 20-kilowatt diesel generator.

QUINT/ENGINE 104 DISBANDED

According to Station No. 3's web site:

Effective July 12, 2005 at 0700 hours Quint 104 was officially disbanded. In place of Quint 104 (which ran as one of ten engine companies in the ACFD) Tower 104 was placed in service using the former 2001 E-One 95' platform from Tower 105 (Tower 105 received one of the new 2005 E-One CR-100 aerials) Arlington County now runs 9 Engine Companies, 2 Ladders, 1 Tower and 2 Heavy Rescues.

The closing of Quint 104 will increase the call volume for Engine 103 by several hundred runs a year. We will now be second due into all of the Rosslyn area along with picking up first due in some of Quint 104's area. In Station 4's first due area all medical locals, public service calls, etc. will be handled by Rescue 104. All Northside Engine Companies can look forward to a significant increase in call volume to cover the huge void left by Quint 104 on all fire related incidents. Sleeping all night at Station 3 may be a thing of the past!

Station 4 will now be a "Specialty House" running Tower 104, Rescue 104, Medic 104 the North Battalion and Logistics Coordinator. Station 4 is also part of the Technical Rescue Team along with Station 10.

4TH ALARM IN FAIRFAX COUNTY

On July 3, 2005, Arlington County firefighters - from Stations 106, 102, 108 and 103 as well as the Northside battlion chief - provided mutual aid to Fairfax County for a rare four-alarm fire.

Following is a report from www.ffxfire.com

0326hrs 4th Alarm Box 1811 7316 & 7318 Lee Hy--E418 arrived to find a 3 story garden apt with fire on the 3rd floor and thru the roof. A second was quickly called with an EMS task force, the Helo and a 3rd alarm. A 4th alarm was called a few minutes later. One burn PT was located and flown to Medstar. Companies were pulled out of the building and several tower ladders were put to work to knock the fire down. A shelter was opened at the nearby Timber Lane ES as 80 people were displaced. Chief Coffman had the command. A-Shift

0326 1st-E418 430 428 106 TL430 T106 R418 A430 EMS404 EMS402 BC404 DFCO (Coffman)

0332 2nd-E413 408 102 TL408 M106 CAN413 LA207 E207 EMS405 BC402 SAFO

0339 EMS Task Force A428 A413 M408 M102 EMS403 E423

0341 3rd-RE433 410 402 T410 EMS401 BC112

0355 4th-E108 103 401 TL401 BC443

Also-PIO402 HFX1 LAB401 FM18 CHP401 COM410 AFCO CAN408 DFCOC IV02 IV11 IV08 LA437

In another mutal box run to Fairfax County, Arlington County firefighters helped battle a two-alarm fire that leveled a mansion on Crest Lane in McLean on Aug. 17, 2005. NBC4 reported ``someone who lives inside the home has a connection to the United Arab Emirates.'' The Secret Service - charged with protecting diplomatic compounds - was called to the scene.

WORKER KILLED AT NATIONAL AIRPORT

A baggage handler died in an accident at Reagan National Airport on June 7, 2005, according to news reports. National Airport and Arlington County firefighters responded to the alarm and found a worker pinned between a belt-loader and a US Airways aircraft parked at Gate 23 as the aircraft was being prepared for a flight to Chicago, according to the reports.

SERIAL ARSONIST PLEADS GUILTY

Evidence discovered by the Arlington County Fire Department led to the arrest of the man responsible for a two-year arson spree across the Washington area, including fires that killed two elderly women in the District of Columbia.

Thomas A. Sweat, 50, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder, second-degree murder and other charges June 6, 2005 in federal court in Greenbelt, Maryland, The Washington Post reported. He was arrested in April.

At the time of the arrest, the Post provided the following account of the investigation:

The biggest break came Dec. 5, when Arlington County firefighters recovered Marine Corps dress pants and a Marine hat near a small deck fire in the 300 block of North Bryant Street.

Capt. Tom Polera of the Arlington Fire Department said the items were found near the scene. The blaze was never reported to the news media, Polera said, because of the little damage it caused and because of the evidence left behind.

ATF officials said they learned about the Arlington fire two days after it occurred. They said they were not convinced it was connected to the serial arsonist but decided to submit the pants to the agency's crime lab for tests.

It wasn't until April 1 that they got the results: DNA from the pants matched DNA recovered from the two earlier fires and attempted arson in Maryland and the District, authorities said.

In a message to the department on April 27, Arlington County Fire Chief James Schwartz said: ``The lead investigator from ATF (the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms) commented to me today that the case progressed in no small part due to the dogged determination of our fire marshals. Congratulations to OFM on a great job.''

FIRE GUTS ABANDONED `DUCKPIN' ALLEY

On June 1, 2005, a suspicious two-alarm fire gutted the abandoned Duckpin Bowling Center at 400 South Maple Avenue in Falls Church - the same day demolition was scheduled to start to make way for a residential and commercial project.

The fire was reported at about 1 a.m. and the building was engulfed in flames when firefighters arrived, NBC News4 reported. Crews engaged in an ``exterior attack'' and video posted on NBC4.com showed Truck 106's aerial in action. No injuries were reported.

Captain Tom Polera, assistant fire marshal for Arlington County, told News4 that the old bowling alley's interior had been stripped for demolition. Electricity to the building had also been cut, Polera said.

The following equipment was dispatched, according to Fire Station No. 3's web site, www.acfd3.com :

FIRST ALARM
Engines 106, 428, 418, 108, Trucks 106 and 410, Rescue 418, Medic 106, Battalion 112 and 111, EMS 404 and FM 114

SECOND ALARM
Engines 102, 103, 410, 104, Towers 430 and 408, Light and Air 103

SPECIAL ALARM
Engine 413, Tower 105

SCHOOL BUS TRAGEDY - 2005

Rescue squad

Horror and heartbreak on Columbia Pike.

An Arlington County school bus bound for Hoffman-Boston Elementary School collided head-on with a trash truck April 18, 2005. Firefighters and bystanders worked to free the 15 children on the bus in the midst of the morning rush hour.

A 9-year-old girl died at the scene and a 7-year-old boy succumbed to his injuries two days later.The bus driver, the driver of the AAA & Rainbow Recycling and Trash Removal Service truck and an 11-year-old child girl were admitted to hospital with serious injuries. Other children suffered less severe injuries.

The victims were transported to Children's Hospital in Washington, Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington and Inova Fairfax Hospital in Falls Church. The children ranged in age from kindergarten to Grade 5.

The school bus was traveling west in the far left lane of Columbia Pike and attempting to make a left turn onto South Courthouse Road when it was hit by the eastbound blue trash truck equipped with a front-end loader, according to The Washington Post.

The impact crushed the front of the yellow bus. The trash truck careened into a tree, pinning the driver.

Friends and relatives left flowers and stuffed animals at the site of the tragedy.

Lilibeth Gomez, a third grade student, was prononced dead at the scene. A red tarpaulin covered the section of the bus where the child died. Her body was removed about two hours later. The following day, the Post published a front-page photo of Lilibeth, smiling and clutching a puppy. Witnesses said she was seated two rows behind the bus driver.

Second grader Harrison Orosco died April 20 at Children's Hospital.

Ryan Jakovich, 8, sat across from Lilibeth, according to The Washington Times. The boy ``saw everything," said his mother, Ellen Jakovich, quoted in the April 19 edition of the Times. "It's slowly sinking in for him. He saw a couple of kids not moving. He said to me, "Mom, they were just lying there.'"

The accident renewed the debate over mandatory use of seatbelts on school buses. The bus wasn't equipped with the safety devices. Two days later, police in neighboring Alexandria investigated another school bus wreck. There were no injuries in that accident.

The following weekend, county police and National Transportation Safety Board investigators closed the intersection of Columbia Pike and Courthouse Road and re-enacted the chain of events leading up to the tragedy, using a similar school bus and a similar trash
truck.

Firefighters, bystanders respond

The response to the accident was equivalent to that of a two- or three- alarm fire.

According to the web site MUTUALBOX.COM:

The incident brought numerous engine companies from Arlington, both truck companies and rescue squads along with Rescue 206 from Alexandria. (Operations Chief Ben) Barksdale was the incident commander with divisions and groups handled by battalion chiefs and captains. There were two helicopters also called to the scene.

Another report on the accident from Fire Station No. 3's web site said:

Engine 101, Tower 105 (the first-due units) and Battalion 111 (Chief Randy Gray) arrived almost simultaneously. Chief Gray declared a "major emergency" ... The driver of the trash truck was pinned in the mangled wreckage of his cab for over an hour. The crews from Rescue 104, 109, Rescue Engine 161, Tower 105 and Rescue 206 worked feverishly to free him. Every tool in their extrication arsenal was used on this job.

Arlington County Fire Chief James Schwartz said ``a number of citizens'' helped rescue children from the wreckage, according to the Associated Press. Many were lifted from the rear emergency exit. Firefighters, meantime, spent 30 minutes freeing the truck driver from his twisted cab. He was evacuated by helicopter to Fairfax Hospital.

The AP also reported:

Willena Roney, 43, from Arlington, Va., was riding a Metrobus that came upon the gruesome accident scene. She and three others got off the Metrobus and started pulling children out of the school bus.

"A lot of them were bleeding," Roney said. "They were scared and upset."

The Post offered this account:

The driver of the mangled school bus sat on a curb, bloodied and screaming, as emergency workers and others tended her injuries and tried to calm her. Suddenly, she sprang to her feet and darted back to the bus to try to help the injured children.

Dozens of others -- office workers, a Metrobus driver, nearby residents, firefighters, paramedics -- also rushed to the school bus, knowing that children were trapped inside.

Jenae Johnson, 28, said she heard the piercing squeal of brakes and whirled around to look out the third-story window of her apartment in the Dorchester Towers on Columbia Pike. Johnson dialed 911. As she waited for an operator, she watched as commuters jumped from their vehicles and flooded from their apartments to help the injured. Johnson recalled the heroism of one woman in particular, who ran from her car to help. "She kicked off her shoes, opened the back of the bus and started helping children out," Johnson said. "She was amazing."

Bus No. 113, Route 271

Parents rushed to the school as news of the accident spread through the community. Others telephoned the school.

Arlington County Public Schools released a statement shortly after the accident:

An accident this morning involving an Arlington Public School bus and a trash truck resulted in one fatality. Parents of children have been contacted.

At approximately 8:40 a.m., Arlington Public School Bus #113/route #271 to Hoffman-Boston Elementary School was traveling westbound on Columbia Pike. The trash truck was traveling eastbound on Columbia Pike and the two vehicles collided near the intersection of South Courthouse Road.

A total of 17 people were involved in the vehicles; two adults, who were driving the vehicles, and 15 children. One child was fatally injured. Four patients including the two adults and two children were critically injured. The truck driver was evacuated by helicopter.

All passengers have been transported to local area hospitals. Arlington Public Schools counseling teams are assisting parents at the hospital and children and staff at the school.

Arlington County Police Department’s Critical Accident Team is handling the investigation, assisted by the Virginia State Police.

`Very sad day for all of us'

Later in the day, the school system issued another statement:

Nine-year-old Lilibeth Gomez was killed in a collision this morning just before 9 a.m. between an Arlington Public Schools bus and a commercial trash truck. She was a third-grade student at Hoffman-Boston Elementary School.

Two children, ages seven and 11, were also seriously injured during the accident. The bus was transporting students to Hoffman-Boston and was traveling westbound on Columbia Pike. The commercial trash truck was traveling eastbound on Columbia Pike and the two vehicles collided near the intersection of South Courthouse Road.

“Today is a very sad day for all of us in Arlington,” said Arlington School Superintendent Dr. Rob Smith. “My deepest personal sympathies go to the Gomez family; I cannot imagine the heartbreak that this family is going through. I know everyone in the community will keep all the students and families in their hearts and in their thoughts.”

A total of 17 people were involved in this morning’s accident – 15 children and two drivers. Twelve children were treated and released at a local area hospital. Two children remain hospitalized; one remains in critical condition and one is in serious condition. The drivers remain hospitalized and in critical condition.

Arlington Public Schools will continue to provide counseling and support to Hoffman-Boston parents, students and staff. Arlington’s Department of Human Services will have outreach staff available for anyone in the community who needs additional assistance.

Accident investigation

In July, the drivers of both the bus and the truck were charged with reckless driving, according to press reports. Investigators had ruled out major mechanical problems.

The bus and the trash truck were hauled to the Arlington County equipment yard for examination by the National Transportation Safety Board after the accident, The Washington Post reported April 20.

The Post also said:

The turn signal on the mangled bus continued to tick, stuck at the moment of impact. Authorities said their investigation will be conducted in painstaking detail. They will take days, if not weeks, to inspect both vehicles, sift through the debris and interview witnesses.

"They're doing a very, very methodical and thorough investigation on this," said Arlington police spokesman Matt Martin. "It's going to take time."

The Washington Examiner, in its April 20 editions, reported:

A preliminary investigation by the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board revealed that the school bus was in its proper lane when the accident occurred.

The bus was preparing to make a left turn at the intersection, but had not yet begun to turn, when it was struck head-on by a garbage truck.

Tire marks "indicate that the bus was in its proper lane," said Debbie Hersman, an NTSB spokeswoman.

Responding units

Fire Station No. 3's web site said the following units responded to the alarm:

Engines 101, 105, 109, 107, 110; Quint 104; Rescues 109, 104, 206 (Alexandria); Rescue Engine 161 (Fort Myer); Tower 105; Truck 106; Medics 101, 102, 104, 105, 106, 109, 110, 206, 207, 410 (Fairfax County); EMS 111, 112; Battalions 111, 112; Fire Chief (Jim Schwartz); Operations Chief (Ben Barksdale); EMS Chief (Jim Bonzano); Services Chief (John White).

ATTACK ON THE PENTAGON - SEPT. 11, 2001

By Vinny Del Giudice
Editor, Arlington Fire Journal

The firehouse at the Pentagon heliport is the quietest in Arlington County, Virginia. The little station, located just off the landing pad on the west side of Defense Department headquarters, is typically staffed by a small crew of civilian firefighters from the U.S. Army's Fort Myer Fire Department.

At 9:39 a.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001, the crew of Foam Tender 161 was at ``Ground Zero,’’ on the banks of the Potomac River, across from Washington, D.C.

Piloting four hijacked airliners, terrorists took aim at the heart and soul of America, toppling the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City and setting the Pentagon ablaze. Nineteen fanatics – led by an Egyptian named Mohammed Atta and backed by Osama bin Laden’s ruthless Al Qaeda network – committed mass murder in the financial and governmental centers of the nation. Atta piloted the first of two aircraft to hit the trade center.

At the Pentagon, 189 people died, including a woman who succumbed at the Washington Hospital Center burn unit days later. Everyone on the airplane - 64 passengers and crew - perished. The others, including soldiers and sailors and members of the Defense Intelligence Agency, died inside the Pentagon.

The greatest loss of life, of course, was in lower Manhattan. More than 2,000 people died in New York, including 343 members of the New York Fire Department - a roll call larger than the fire department in Arlington County. Other first responders in New York, including city and port authority police officers and a member of the New York Fire Patrol, perished as well.

A fourth aircraft went down in a field in rural Pennsylvania as passengers heroically struggled with hijackers. Forty-five died there, and there was little members of the township's volunteer fire department could do when they reached the scene - a giant smoking hole. That jetliner was likely headed to Washington too, and the White House, Capitol, Treasury and other government buildings were evacuated after the Pentagon crash.

In all, the death toll in New York, Arlington and Pennsylvania topped Pearl Harbor.

Loss of Foam Tender 161

Fort Myer firefighter Alan Wallace, a veteran federal firefighter, was tending to the foam rig on the Pentagon fire station ramp, when he heard the Boeing 757’s screaming engines – and looked to the sky. American Airlines Fight 77 to Los Angeles, with 64 souls aboard, had been hijacked from Washington-Dulles International Airport. ``Runnnnn!’’ Wallace yelled to a buddy, firefighter Mark Skipper.

The plane was 200 yards away - and 25 feet off the ground.

``There was no time to look back, barely time to scramble’’ for Wallace and the others, The Washington Post said. ``He made it about 30 feet, heard a terrible roar, felt the heat, and dove underneath a van, skinning his stomach as he slid across the blacktop, sailing across it as though he were riding a luge.

``A few seconds later he was sliding back out to check on his friend and then race back to the fire truck,’’ the Post said. ``He jumped in threw it into gear, but the accelerator was dead. The entire back of the truck was destroyed, the cab on fire. He grabbed the radio handset and called the main station at Fort Myer to report the unimaginable.’’

It was a firestorm – a war zone. Our Pearl Harbor – ``The Big One.’’

'I wanted to help'

Volunteer association president Harold LeRoy, one of the grand old men of the Arlington County Fire Department, was at his home in Virginia Highlands, not far from the Pentagon, when he heard the rumble. ``Sounds like one of those construction sites collapsed at Pentagon City,’’ LeRoy told his wife. The telephone rang. It was his daughter. Put on the television, she told him.

Ailing and in his 80s, all LeRoy could do was watch from a distance. ``I remember the Pentagon when it was just a hole in the ground,’’ said LeRoy, who joined the Jefferson District Volunteer Fire Department in 1939. ``I grew up with that building. I wanted to help. That really hurt.’’

LeRoy had been among those to fight a general alarm fire in the Pentagon’s basement on July 2, 1959, the previous ``Big One.’’

This was worse – much, much worse.

Flight 77 touched off from Runway ``Three-zero'' at Dulles at about 8:20 a.m. Investigators estimate it was commandeered about 30 minutes later over southern Ohio by five hijackers. What's more, the jetliner ``disappeared from controllers' radar screens for at least 30 minutes -- in part because it was hijacked in an area of limited radar coverage,'' The Washington Post said, adding: ``That gap cost military and aviation officials valuable warning time.'' It wasn't until 12 minutes before impact that ``controllers at Dulles sounded an alert that an unidentified aircraft was headed toward Washington at high speed,'' the newspaper said.

On the outskirts of the city, Flight 77, which approached from the southwest, made a 270 degree turn toward on the Pentagon.

The hijackers apparently disabled the aircraft's radar transponder, complicating the hunt. Transcripts from the Indianapolis air traffic center heralded the worst: ``American 77 departed off of Dulles is going to L.A. Dispatch doesn't know where he's at and confirmed that two airplanes have been - uh - they crashed into - uh - the World Trade Center in New York. So as far as American 77, we don't know where he is.''

Hijackers named by FBI

The FBI identified the hijackers of Flight 77 as Khalid Al-Midhar, Majed Moqed, Nawaq Alhamzi, Salem Alhamzi and Hani Hanjour. FBI agents suspected Hanjour was the pilot; the others apparently provided the muscle. With the help of a local man, some of the hijackers fraudulently acquired identification cards through the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles office in Arlington, The Washington Post said.

``Investigators believe the passengers were herded into the rear of the plane,'' according to the BBC. ``Among the passengers was TV commentator Barbara Olson, wife of US Solicitor General Theodore Olson. She called her husband twice. She said the hijackers were armed with knives and boxcutters and she asked him, "What should I tell the pilot to do?" During the second call he told her a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. ''

The Washington Post said: ``Three District (of Columbia) schoolchildren and three teachers were on Flight 77, headed to Santa Barbara, Calif., for an ecology conference sponsored by National Geographic.''

The Post also said Sept. 12 of the souls aboard Flight 77: ``There was not even the grace of instant death. Instead, there was time to call from the sky over Virginia, fingers pumping cell phones, terrified passengers talking to loved ones for one final time.''

On its final descent, Flight 77 passed over Arlington National Cemetery.

Roaring at 530 miles per hour, the jetliner penetrated 310 feet into the Pentagon's reinforced steel infrastructure within a second or two of the fiery impact, according to an analysis by the American Society of Civil Engineers. The engineering report was issued in January 2003.

Bill Wright, a civilian employee of the Army, was at his desk on the first floor of the Pentagon and discussing the attack on the World Trade Center when "something fell out of the ceiling and hit me on the head," he told the Baltimore Sun. Wright was thrown 20 feet from his desk and lost his glasses. An Air Force officer helped him escape. ``I'm just lucky as hell,'' said Wright, whose head was wrapped in a bandage.

Worse than Oklahoma City

The death toll at the Pentagon alone on Sept. 11 was higher than the 168 killed in the bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building on April 19, 1995. It also exceeded the death toll of another Potomac River tragedy, the crash of an Air Florida jetliner into the nearby 14th Street Bridge during a snowstorm on Jan. 13, 1982. That tragedy occurred very close to the Pentagon.

The scene - if such comparisons can be made - was more shocking considering the psychological effect of striking at the core of the nation's military might as well as New York's ``Twin Towers.''

In a video that surfaced in December, bin Laden spoke of how he and his deputies learned of the initial attack in New York from news reports. "They were overjoyed when the first plane hit the building," bin Laden said. "So I said to them: 'Be patient.'"

Flames raged at the Pentagon.

Concrete floors caved in. Columns collapsed. Steel melted.

Black smoke turned the morning light to darkness.

The ghastly plume was visible from the White House, Capitol and other points across the Potomac River.

The hijacked 757 had pierced the unique internal structure consisting of five rings of parallel corridors. A remote security camera recorded images of the jetliner – really just a blur – hurtling across the Pentagon grounds and then the angry orange fireball, with the Pentagon firehouse visible.

Burned and bruised, Wallace and the other Fort Myer firefighters turned to help the people streaming, stumbling and jumping from the Pentagon. Even in combat, in Vietnam, Wallace had never seen anything like it, the Post said.

``A structural collapse, a building fire and a plane crash all rolled up into one’’ – that’s what firefighters faced, John Huff told the Associated Press. Huff, a deputy fire chief from Lincoln, Nebraska, led a Federal Emergency Management Agency urban search and rescue task force at the Pentagon.

Generals and admirals were shaken as well. "We have a variety of plans for a variety of things," said Rear Admiral Craig Quigley, quoted by the Scripps Howard News Service. "But what you're seeing here is a full assault on the United States of America."

Less than a year earlier, military and civilian agencies, including the Arlington County Fire Department held a table top exercise that included a mock crash of a passenger jet at the Pentagon courtyard, according to a November 2000 press release from the Military District of Washington. ``Our role is fire and rescue,'' Arlington Battalion Chief Robert Cornwell said at that Oct. 24-26 exercise. Eleven months later, Cornwell, a Vietnam veteran and more recently a cancer survivor, was a senior fire officer supervising the Sept. 11 response.

Fire and rescue forces

The Arlington County Fire Department was the lead agency in the response to the Pentagon attack. The county fire department operates 10 stations, and is a signatory to an automatic regional response plan with neighboring Fairfax County as well as the city of Alexandria, and participates in a regional mutual aid pact with the District of Columbia and the Maryland counties of Montgomery and Prince George’s.

The Fort Myer Fire Department, which operates the Pentagon station in addition to a firehouse at its main post, protects the Army base, Arlington National Cemetery, the Marine Corps’ Henderson Hall, the Navy Annex and the Pentagon, operates as a part of the county system. Reagan Washington National Airport, also in Arlington County, fields a fire department and works closely with the county's fire service.

On Sept. 11, 2001, the Arlington County Fire Department employed 279 men and women, supplemented by the volunteer firefighters and EMTs of the Arlington County Fire & Rescue Association. (More career firefighters were hired after the attack, bringing the total to 305 by 2005. Minimum staffing on the county's engine companies was also increased to four firefighters from three in the months after the attack. A number of new volunteers also signed after the Sept. 11 attack, and the county trained CERT Teams - Citizens Emergency Response Teams - in cooperation with the federal Department of Homeland Security as a part of its stepped up disaster preparedness program.)

Long before the attack, Arlington County Fire Chief Edward Plaugher had -- as Fire Chief magazine described it -- ``connected the dots'' and warned the Washington area was vulnerable to terrorist attack.

After a sarin gas attack in the Tokyo subway killed 12 people in 1995, Plaugher and other fire chiefs in the region mapped out contingencies, with Plaugher speculating - according to Fire Chief magazine - that a truck bomb would be the most likely incident. That planning, according to the Congressional Commission investigating the attacks, contributed to a mostly successful response to the crash of Flight 77.

``What I actually said to an audience of 2,000 people years earlier was that on that day, when I stand on that hill looking down at a smoking Pentagon - as fire chief responsible for responding to incidents at the Pentagon - I want the very best experts there to advise me and help me through this incident," said Plaugher, who was named Fire Chief magazine's Career Chief of the Year in 2004.

Airport firefighters assault flames

Captain Michael Defina, a member of the airport fire department, was attending to an auto accident near the Pentagon when he heard ``a dull roar,’’ according to The Virginia Fire News. ``I turned and saw a smoke plume arise … I knew it wasn’t an accident.’’

Crews from Arlington County, Fort Myer and the airport were fully aware of the twin attacks on the twin towers in New York as they answered the alarm at Box 7560. As the Post reported: ``Arlington firefighter Andrea Kaiser freely admits that she was terrified Tuesday as she steered Engine 101 toward the Pentagon – terrified that terrorists would strike again, terrified of a structural collapse, terrified that there would be no survivors.’’

Defina ordered the airport’s big green Foam 331 to the heliport. The rig ``hit the fire with foam from its roof and bumper turrets,’’ according to Virginia Fire News. Firefighters from another airport unit, Rescue Engine 335, assisted the injured and tended to fires in diesel fuel and propane tanks at the crash site, the Fire News said.

Fort Myer's Wallace and Skipper, and the third man on their crew, Dennis Young, helped pull 10 to 15 people from a window, according to the Pentagram newspaper. ``Everywhere people were yelling trying to give directions for people to get out,'' Wallace said. (Coincidentally, Fort Myer was the site of the world's first fatal aircraft accident in September 1908. Army Lieutenant Thomas Selfridge was fatally injured during a demonstration flight piloted by inventor Orville Wright.)

On Sept. 11, Arlington Hospital received most of the casualties, including Wallace, who suffered burn injuries. More severe burn cases went to the Washington Hospital Center, which operates the region's burn unit. Northern Virginia Community Hospital in Arlington also received the injured. The Washington region's other hospitals were placed on alert. The American Red Cross made an emergency appeal for blood supplies, which it described as ``critically short.''

Communications, meantime, were problematic.

The Sept. 11 Commission report said:

Almost all aspects of communications continue to be problematic, from initial notification to tactical operations. Cellular telephones were of little value . . . Radio channels were initially oversaturated . . . Pagers seemed to be the most reliable means of notification when available and used, but most firefighters are not issued pagers.

Collapse! - Captain Gibbs' evacuation order

Reaching the seat of the fire proved difficult. The heat was intense and the flames violent. Jet fuel is a blend of kerosene and gasoline, and Flight 77 was fully laden for the coast-to-coast flight.
Firefighters launched an exterior attack, using ladder pipes, airport crash tenders – all their big guns. They also attempted an interior attack. ``It was back breaking work carrying hose across that debris,’’ said Captain Scott McKay, who supervised interior fire fighting efforts. ``We were passing by some pretty good fires that on any other day would have been a major job to get to the big fire.’’

About 30 minutes after the crash, five floors gave way - COLLAPSE! ``It pancaked,’’ said Arlington Battalion Chief Jim Bonzano.

And yet, none of the firefighters were injured in the collapse.

Arlington Fire Captain Charles Gibbs ordered firefighters attempting to battle the flames from the inside to evacuate after hearing radio traffic about a fissure - stretching from the ground to the roof - adjacent to the crash site. The airport's Defina, in an interview in 2002, said he reported the crack over the radio. Others apparently radioed similar warnings.

Gibbs, who was assigned to the county fire academy, recounted the events of that day in an article in the Journal newspapers marking the first anniversary of the attack. He saw the jetliner fly over the fire academy, heard a muffled explosion, hopped into a Ford explorer with another fire officer and headed to the Pentagon.``I said to myself, `That is not a normal flight path,''' he said. ``It was so close it looked like it was going to hit Glebe Road.''

Once at the scene, incident commander James Schwartz, Arlington's assistant fire chief for operations, ``asked me if I had my gear with me, and I said I did. Then he pointed to the impact sight and said, `Go up there and tell me what is going on.'''

Gibbs led a crew of Fort Myer and Arlington County firefighters inside with a hose line. Considering the crack in the building, and seeing the firefighters were making little progress against the flames, Gibbs decided there was no need to place the firefighters' lives in jeopardy - and ordered them out. Within five minutes, ``there was a snap. Then you could hear it cascading down,'' Gibbs said. ``It hit the ground in a big thunder and shook and then it was all over. I guess timing is everything.''

After the collapse, firefighters went back with six hose lines – five lines from Arlington apparatus and another from Fort Myers’ rescue engine – in their struggle to contain the inferno, McKay said. The mighty exterior streams ``couldn’t get to the seat of the fire,’’ said McKay, who coincidentally, was attending counter-terrorism training in Washington when the terrorists struck.

The members of Arlington’s Rescue Squad 109 got within 10 feet of the jetliner’s remains while searching offices and conference rooms for survivors. They couldn’t get any further because of the fire. ``It was fed by jet fuel,’’ Bonzano said. ``It was rolling.’’

Chief Plaugher takes to the sky

With the initial response to the Pentagon in the capable hands of Arlington County Assistant Fire Chief James Schwartz, Arlington County Fire Chief Edward Plaugher took to the sky to get a bird’s eye view. According to the Post, Plaugher ``hurried to a U.S. Park Police helicopter.

Looking up at the pilot, Plaugher pointed to the words `FIRE CHIEF’ on his white hat and jabbed his finger toward the blackened sky. `I need to go up,’ he said.

``Hovering over the nation’s largest office building, the 54-year-old chief could see whatever had caused the destruction – he didn’t know then that it was an airliner – had penetrated three of the Pentagon’s rings,’’ the Post said. ``He also quickly got a handle on the extent of the fire’s reach. Plaugher relayed his concern to Schwartz that there could be further collapses. He also told his assistant to stick with what he was doing; deploying hundreds of firefighters and paramedics medics responding from all over the Washington region.’’

Plaugher wanted to see the big picture. So huge is the Pentagon that its corridors encompass more than 15 miles. ``What he recognized was that there was the need for somebody to be looking at all the pieces,’’ Schwartz said. ``What you got from where I was standing, while it was awesome in its scope, you couldn’t see the whole thing.’’

But it wasn't until that Friday, Sept. 14, that firefighters reached what Plaugher described as ``the heart of the crash site.''

''Anything like this I would not probably be describing it adequately to you,'' said Plaugher, quoted by the AP. ''It's just not capable of putting in words that type of destruction, that type of death that you're seeing.''

Secretary Rumsfeld pitches in

In the minutes and hours following the crash, countless civilians and military pitched in.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld helped the injured onto stretchers for about 15 minutes, according to The New York Times and other press reports.

A priest administered last rites to the dead.

Metro sent buses for the walking wounded.

Heavy-duty cranes arrived to aid in the rescue and recovery effort, and trucks from Home Depot shuttled lumber for shoring.

Soldiers raced shopping carts bottled water, soft drinks and other refreshments to the triage area from the Pentagon's QuikMart service station.

Private ambulances, normally used for routine transport between nursing homes, hospitals and clinics, were pressed into emergency service.

Retired firefighters – at least one who retired on medical disability 10 years earlier – reported for duty.

Captain Blunt's account

Captain Ed Blunt, an Arlington County Fire Department EMS supervisor, recounted Sept. 11 on JEMS.com, web site of the Journal of Emergency Medical Services:

I had already seen the first tower get hit on the news that morning. I was actually en route to a fire in Rosslyn (Va.) when the Pentagon was attacked. On my way out the door of the fire station, I warned my crew to stay alert. One of them just looked at me and said, “This is Arlington. Nothing like that will ever happened here.” When I saw him later that day at the incident, he told me he’d never say anything like that again.

Engine 101 actually saw the jetliner plow into the northwest side of the Pentagon. The radio crackled, “Engine 101—emergency traffic, a plane has gone down into the Pentagon. I made a quick U-turn and was on scene within a minute to a minute and a half of the initial impact. En route, I remembered my wife was scheduled to be on a flight to Dulles at 10 a.m.

People were just leaving their vehicles on Highway 110 and staring in disbelief. I wanted to put myself in a position where we wouldn’t be threatened by a secondary explosion. I set up triage, treatment and transport sectors in a grassy area on a hill with a good vantage point of the incident. I special ordered 20 paramedic units and a bus for the walking wounded, along with a couple of helicopters.

We weren’t alone on scene. There was an outpouring of help from military personnel—doctors, nurses, paramedics, EMTs, stretcher bearers. I also requested the response of our north EMS supervisor, Capt. Alan Dorn. He arrived quickly and did a fantastic job of managing these areas and coordinating with the military’s medical personnel. Chief James Bonzano arrived on scene and established an official EMS division.

Five or six minutes after my arrival, I traveled alongside the structure and came upon 13 serious burn victims. Many of them also had shrapnel wounds. There was one guy—I couldn’t tell if he was Army or Marine Corps because his uniform was so badly burned—who had used his hands to shield his face from the shrapnel, and his fingers had been cut clean off. But he wouldn’t let us treat him until we helped the others.

As we tended to those 13 wounded, we received an order to evacuate the area because of reports that another jet was coming up the Potomac.

We all agreed we weren’t going to leave those patients, so we switched to a rapid transport mode. We put multiple patients in Medics 102 and 105 and a park service helicopter and told them to just go to the hospital—with limited on-scene care.

We were fortunate in many ways. All our off-duty officers were at a mandatory seminar in Arlington, so they were within two minutes of the Pentagon. We also had other staff attending a nearby International Monetary Fund planning meeting. The military personnel on scene were extremely helpful in keeping the scene organized.

To aid in transport efforts, we had the police clear Highway 110 in both directions so we would have free highway access for rapid patient transport.

One problem we had was keeping military personnel away from the crash site. They felt compelled to try to run in and save their buddies, but the building was heavily involved in the fire. We had to use firefighters to help restrain them.

Once we did get inside, we were able to see the destruction for ourselves. It was extensive on the interior because of the inertia of the fire and fuel once the jet entered beyond the outer ring. The skin of the building doesn’t tell you squat about the damage. There were some areas where people hadn’t even been burned, but were killed by the forced inhalation of fumes.

We had 10 different fire and EMS agencies officially involved in the incident, and it went as well as it possibly could have. Like at any large incident, units self-dispatched themselves to the incident. Although only 20 units were officially requested, we ended up with 75 units on a scene that generated 92 patients.

Chief Bonzano's account

In an article in the Washingtonian magazine on the first anniversary of the attack, Battalion Chief Jim Bonzano reflected on Sept. 11:

The first hours - we call them the golden hours - that's when you have the best chance of finding people alive.

I'm so proud of our guys. A firefighter carries a 45-minute bottle of oxygen on his back. Guys would go in, use that whole bottle, come out and want to strap on another bottle and go back. Those are the kind of guys you want, guys who won't give up. But you had to jerk the reins, make sure we were sending in fresh personnel. Because they stop thinking about their own safety.

I have this friend, Captain Ed Blunt, who was there from the beginning. The day of the crash he said to me, ``Jimmy, Kay is flying back from Chicago.'' Kay is his wife. He didn't know if she was on that flight. Nobody knew where that plane was from. And I said, ``Eddie, we need to get you out. And he said, ``No I need to be here.'' And what he was telling me was that the task at hand was something he could handle, something he knew how to do. Think about his wife at that point was something he couldn't do.

`Full power, no flaps'

The Baltimore Sun newspaper, in its account of the attack, said:

The Pentagon, for half a century the nerve center of America's armed forces, became a casualty ... An Alexandria police officer said the jet was going "full power, no flaps," when it struck the Pentagon. ... Some compared the scene to a battlefield ... A grim Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld told reporters it was too early to have casualty figures."It will not be a few," he said. ... Local hospitals reported caring for 56 Pentagon workers, at least eight of them in intensive care.

Attempting a return to normality, Rumsfeld held his news conference in the Pentagon's briefing room. "The Pentagon's functioning. It will be in business tomorrow," he said. ... The Pentagon has no defense systems, such as anti-aircraft guns or missiles, that could counter air attacks ...

Rumsfeld said he was in his third-floor office was on the opposite side of the building when he felt the shock of the explosion. He immediately ran down to the damaged area and helped place the injured on stretchers. "They were bringing bodies out that had been injured, seriously injured," Rumsfeld said.

Then Rumsfeld went into the National Military Command Center, the Pentagon's nerve center, a warren of conference rooms and offices, some equipped with huge display screens for teleconferences among the top military brass. But even in those offices, there was smoke, Quigley said. The damaged Pentagon was placed on "threat condition delta," the highest security condition, he said.

Emergency personnel recalled

Off-duty Arlington County police, fire and 911 personnel were recalled, and the equivalent of 10 or more alarms summoned fire and rescue equipment from across metropolitan Washington to the Pentagon and to cover Arlington County’s fire stations. ``It was crazy,’’ recalled volunteer firefighter Reade Bush. ``Who would’ve thought Kensington, Maryland would be filling the Ballston station? Or Lake Jackson, Virginia filling Station 1?’’

Arlington County Managers Ron Carlee declared a state of emergency for the county, primarily to facilitate the arrival from urban search and rescue teams from Fairfax County, Virginia, Montgomery County, Maryland and the City of Virginia Beach.

Workers from other county agencies, from public works to public schools, were pressed into service. Lauren Callan, power plant supervisor for the school system, dispatched portable generators and trucks to the Pentagon, the Journal newspapers reported. Callan compared the experience to his service in the Vietnam War. ``The only difference was, in Vietnam, you'd occasionally get shot at,'' the former member of the Army Corps of Engineers said.

On Sept. 11, security was also stepped up across the Washington region.

Streets surrounding the White House were sealed off.

Federal workers were sent home.

National Guard units were activated to patrol streets.

National Airport closed, and flights were diverted to other fields. There was speculation whether the airport would ever reopen because of its proximity to Washington. (Fearing more hijackings, the Federal Aviation Administration ordered commercial flights nationwide to land. The FAA also instructed international flights to divert to Canada and other countries.)

Children in modular classrooms at the county's public schools were moved to safer quarters inside the main school buildings, though the county decided to keep schools open for the duration. School buses, most certainly, would have added to the congestion on roadways and slowed the response of mutual aid fire and rescue apparatus.

D.C. Fire Department

The District of Columbia Fire Department dispatched a second-alarm assignment moments after the crash, and D.C. Fire Chief Ronnie Fews placed the department’s ``Plan E’’ in effect, recalling off-duty firefighters, according to the DCFD.com. A third-alarm assignment from D.C. followed. The district’s fire companies also staged at Pennsylvania Avenue and 15th Street, Northwest, near the White House, as a precaution.

Staging areas were also established about a mile away from the Pentagon at Arlington County Fire Station No. 1 and down the street from the firehouse at the Thomas Jefferson Community Center and further to the north at Station No. 6 in Falls Church. Relief crews were assured, ``There'll be enough fire for everybody.''

The massive response recalled Dec. 7, 1941 at Pearl Harbor, based on the following account of that attack from Honolulu Fire Chief William Blaisdell, and published in the book ``Fire in America!" by Paul R. Lyons of the National Fire Protection Association:

Within half an hour after the first attack, all off-duty firemen were called by radio broadcasts from three stations, and all but a few who live in rural Oahu had reported within two hours. Scores of volunteers thronged the stations, and workmen from other city departments were assigned as emergency firemen.

`It was pitch black'

As the flames darkened, firefighters advanced back inside the Pentagon. ``It was pitch black, and the walls seemed ready to buckle,’’ the Post said, recounting the experiences of Engine 101’s crew. ``Everything was scorched, and Kaiser faced heaps of debris everywhere she turned. In one spot, she saw a shirt ticked into a pair of dress slacks. But no body. On the second and third floors, charred people sat at their desks.’’

Reagan National Airport fire department’s mass casualty unit - designed for airplane crashes - supplied body bags.

On Sept. 11 and in the days following, Pentagon police ordered firefighters - fearful of another attack - to evacuate when aircraft neared the crash site. ``We didn’t know if there was another plane coming, bombs or what,’’ said Arlington volunteer firefighter Jane Beck, who was tending to the generator on Light and Air 103. ``I don’t ever remember feeling that much fear.’’ And yet she made the best of it. ``There were bomb dogs all over the place so I kept dog treats in my pocket for them,’’ Beck said.

There was little hope for finding survivors, and no one was quite sure how many people had died. At one point on the evening of Sept. 11, NBC News reported as many as 800 people may have died in the Pentagon. The final toll was much lower, but still daunting - one of the largest mass murders in U.S. history .

The fire, itself, wouldn’t die.

After the initial inferno was knocked down on Sept. 11, firefighters contended with flames and hot spots at the Pentagon, fed by jet fuel and mountains of rubble. ``It’s just stubborn, very difficult to get to and very difficult to extinguish,’’ said Plaugher, quoted by New York Newsday.

A statement issued by the county government on Sept. 12 said:

``The Arlington County Fire Department reports that the fires at the Pentagon are controlled. The fire is not yet considered extinguished, however. Crews will remain on a fire watch for the next three days in the event that other fires do spring up. Arlington County continues to support fire fighting and rescue operations at the Pentagon. There have been no serious injuries to Arlington County emergency workers.''

The blaze – in the five-story behemoth, made up of five concentric rings of offices – was declared out at 3 p.m. on Sept. 13.

Surveying the damage, a member of Congress from Kentucky, Representative Ken Lucas, said: "It hits you right in the pit of your stomach," according to the Associated Press.

Flames wouldn't die

The Pentagon’s concrete, masonry and slate roof made it a ``very, very difficult system to get through to extinguish,’’ Plaugher said. ``It takes a lot of cutting with special tools and equipment and then a lot of hand work by the firefighters to get up in there.’’

At the same time, other firefighters shored up the building and continued to search for survivors, even as hoped faded for bringing out anyone alive. ``The mood is very somber,’’ said Bernie Drake of the Salvation Army, quoted by Newsday. ``They’re kicking butt and working very hard and should be looked at as heroes. It’s a daunting task.’’

Many parts of the building were unstable. On the ground floor, ``there literally were no columns,’’ said Arlington Battalion Chief George Lyon, quoted by the AP. ``The whole structure was unsupported.’’

Captain Scott McKay said he found the absence of the columns ``most intimidating’’ – it meant his crews were in grave danger. And yet, only a few firefighters were injured during the operation, unlike the staggering loses in New York City. What’s more, after the twin towers fell, the Pentagon could reclaim the title ``The World’s Largest Office Building.’’

On Sept. 13, Shawn Kelley, chief fire marshal of Arlington County, reported that rescuers ``received a signal from the flight recorder of the commercial jetliner'' - the so-called ``black box.'' Kelley, quoted by the AP, said searchers know "the general area within the building where they can find the black box," but couldn't reach the site because of the fire and collapse.

The AP also reported that human remains from the Pentagon were flown to the military mortuary at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware for identification.

President Bush visits crash site

President Bush, Vice President Cheney, Governor Gilmore and a number of other dignitaries visited the site, and met with fire and rescue personnel, police officers, soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen. During the president’s visit, firefighters unfurled a giant American flag - the garrison flag from the U.S. Army Band and Fort Myer - from the roof of the Pentagon near the crash site. The flag was lowered a month later, on Oct. 11, with full military honors.

According to a Pentagon press release:

President Bush visited the the Pentagon this afternoon and met with civilian and military workers involved in fire and rescue operations where a Boeing jetliner crashed into the west wall of the building.

Bush toured the site with Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. The two men spoke with rescuers, firefighters and law enforcement personnel.

Firefighters had hung a large American flag from the roof over the side of the Pentagon near the site of the jetliner timpact.

Bush said he was overwhelmed by the devastation. He said he was visiting the site to see the damage for himself and to say thanks to those involved with the effort, "not only here but around the nation."

He wanted to thank the workers in New York City doing the same jobs. "I want to say thanks to the folks who have given blood through the Red Cross, I want to say thanks for the Americans who keep the victims in their prayers," Bush said.

The president inspected the destruction and told reporters that he spoke to Rumsfeld after the attack and the secretary said he had felt the blast move the Pentagon.

"Even though he was on the other side of the building, the building rocked," Bush said. "Now I know why."

That Friday, Chief Plaugher was among those in attendance with the president and first lady, the Rev. Billy Graham and other dignitaries at an interdenominational prayer service at the National Cathedral in Washington. Christian, Muslim and Jewish clergy participated in the service.

Volunteers, Red Cross, Salvation Army assist

At the Pentagon's ``Ground Zero,’’ Arlington County Fire Department volunteers assisted with medical triage, ventilation, debris removal, search and recovery, as well as staffing of rapid intervention teams for rescuing trapped firefighters. Other fire department volunteers assisted the FBI, photocopied maps for mutual aid companies covering Arlington fire stations, and served as navigators.

The volunteers’ Light and Air 103 was pressed into service for the duration, and illuminated the fire ground. Its generators were kept running around the clock. Its inventory of lights, tripods, electrical cables, and junction boxes was picked clean. Another volunteer unit, Utility 103 – driven by Marvin Binns, president of the Cherrydale Volunteer Fire Department – shuttled personnel to and from the scene for 16 hours on Sept. 11. The ladies auxiliary from Falls Church responded with Canteen 106.

Every little bit helped. ``Even those who performed support tasks behind the scenes are greatly appreciated,’’ said James Fortner, chief of the Arlington Volunteer Fire Department. ``Firefighting and EMS isn’t about glory and being in the spotlight.’’

Fire department volunteers visited hospitalized firefighters, transported food, water and supplies, maintained accountability rosters and staffed the staging areas. The volunteers’ Arlington Fire Journal published a ``Pentagon Extra.’’ All told, 52 volunteer members of the Arlington County Fire Department contributed 1,500 hours on Sept. 11 and in the aftermath of the disaster, with some taking annual leave from their jobs.

In addition to uncountable acts of bravery and duty at the Pentagon, there were many of love and kindness. A tent city sprouted up. The Salvation Army and Red Cross set up mobile kitchens, as did McDonalds and Burger King. A church group from North Carolina served hot meals. A search dog cut its paw, was treated by Army doctors and given a police escort to a veterinary hospital. A woman doled out dry socks to firefighters. ``I never thought much about socks before,’’ a firefighter said.

Accolades poured in. Children from across the U.S. sent handmade cards to the firefighters, crafted of crayons and construction paper. One boy’s card said: ``I know that of the reasons that you keep working is because you know somewhere in American a little boy or little girl is counting on you to rescue their parents and I know you will,’’ according to The Washington Times.

Grim search for bodies

Gradually, as the flames died down, the recovery effort intensified. Search and rescue teams from across the country came in to help. It was grueling and draining and depressing – and went on for more than a week. ``Most of the work is being done by hand and by shovels,’’ said firefighter Homer McElroy, quoted by the AP. Even after long days of 12-hour shifts, ``it’s tough to walk away,’’ said assistant chief Tom Carr of the Montgomery County Fire Department, quoted by The Washington Times.

While returning from a smoke inhalation call at Pentagon City aboard Arlington's Ambulance 101, Volunteer Lieutentant Jay Gremillion of Company 1 was moved by the sight of a small American flag ``perched high above the ruins and devastation’’ of the Pentagon.

``Clearly, one of the early tasks of the response teams was to make sure that the flag was flying – and sending the message that our resolve was strong,’’ Gremillion said. ``The small flag was later removed and a large four-story American flag was unfurled to coincide with President Bush’s visit. Still, the sight of that small flag on top of the building and near the impact point is the more poignant symbol in my mind of what we did and the mood of the rescuers – and indeed the country.’’(Sadly, Gremillion died of natural causes about a year later.)

At 7 a.m. on Friday, Sept. 21, the recovery effort officially ended and the site was declared a crime scene, with the Federal Bureau of Investigation taking over from the Arlington County Fire Department. Firefighters stayed on the scene to assist the FBI. After the investigation was completed, construction crews moved in – working almost around the clock – with a goal of completing much of their work by the first anniversary of the attack. The rebuilding effort was dubbed the ``Phoenix Project.’’

A statement issued by the county said:

``Responsibility for incident and site management at the Pentagon crash site was transferred from the Arlington County Fire Department to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) effective at 7 a.m., Friday, Sept. 21. It is anticipated that additional remains will be discovered during the course of the FBI’s investigation. Qualified mortuary personnel remain on site to process these remains.

``Arlington County Fire Department personnel will remain on site to continue to provide emergency protective measures for the FBI. Specifically, they will be providing firewatch and monitoring the safety of the structure as the FBI conducts its investigation. Arlington Police will also assist the FBI in evidence processing as well as provide security as needed.

``The Urban Search and Rescue team from New Mexico completed its last shift on site at 6 p.m., Thursday evening. The team from the Military District of Washington completed its last shift at 6 a.m. Friday morning. All areas of the Pentagon except for the C, D and E rings between the fourth and fifth corridors are being released to the Department of Defense.

``The Arlington Emergency Operations Center remains operational at a staffing level appropriate for this next phase of the operation.

``The FBI expects the crime scene investigation to last about a month. ''

Army Major General James T. Jackson, commanding general of the Military District of Washington, personally thanked the firefighters and civilian engineers at a crash site ceremony on Sept. 21. According to a military press release, Jackson told them: "You truly are the foundation upon which our country will continue to stand."

Rebuilding the fire service

Then the rebuilding began.

The Army declared Foam Tender 161, an E-One Titan 4x4 aircraft fire fighting and rescue vehicle, a total loss and acquired a replacement from Emergency One Inc., of Ocala, Florida. The new rig was delivered to the Fort Myer Fire Department about two weeks after the attack. Federal firefighter Alan Wallace - the man at ``Ground Zero" at "Zero Hour" - recovered from his injuries and returned to work.

On Sept. 22, while the wounds were still fresh, the county board approved $460,969 to upgrade or replace the county’s analog radio network with a digital system. Board Chairman Jay Fisette described the decision as ``a prudent and responsible decision at this time.’’

On Nov. 17, 2001, the county board announced plans to replace its front-line engines with seven new Class A, 1,250-gallon per minute pumps, through a $2.1 million lease with E-One. The new apparatus returned the traditional fire service color of red to the fire department. The county's fire apparatus had been yellow and white since the 1970s as part of a safety program.

Also on Nov. 17, the board approved $280,000 to purchase chemical, biological and radiological detection and decontamination equipment for the police and fire departments. ``The need for such equipment is apparent against the backdrop of the past two months,’’ Fisette said. The fire department also acquired tractor-trailer hazardous materials unit, Hazmat 101, and stocked a mass casualty unit with medical supplies.

(While discussing the issue of equipment, it should be noted there was some friction between the Arlington County Fire Department and the District of Columbia Fire Department as Virginia firefighters accused some of the district firefighters of absconding with their expensive equipment.)

Also in the months after Sept. 11, Assistant Chief James Schwartz, the incident commander at the Pentagon, was appointed to head the county's newly organized emergency management office, to better prepare Arlington for disaster preparedness and response. Among the achievements during his watch at the new department, a text and e-mail paging service for the citizens of the county called ``Arlington Alert.'' Schwartz returned to the fire department in 2004 as fire chief, replacing the retiring Ed Plaugher.

The Fort Myer Fire Department was also given more responsbility within the county fire system in the years after the Sept. 11 attack, with Rescue Engine 161 automatically responding on box alarms and other emergencies in Rosslyn and Crystal City.

'Heroes with grimy faces'

A Day of Remembrance was declared Oct. 11, with a service at Washington and Lee High School honoring the victims of the Pentagon as well as the rescuers. In November, Major General James Jackson of the Military District of Washington presented a commemorative plaque to Plaugher, honoring the work of the fire department.

Alexandria Fire Chief Thomas Hawkins, formerly chief in Arlington County, accepted a plaque for his city's department. ``It’s a double-edged sword,’’ Hawkins told the Journal newspapers. ``First of all, it means we had to go to the second worst disaster in order to get it, but we do appreciate getting recognition.’’ Alexandria rotated all 200 of its firefighters to the crash site.

The military also honored the Fairfax County Fire and Rescue Department, which sent more than 400 firefighters and support personnel. In addition to providing personnel and equipment at the crash site, Fairfax County provided a special manpower unit, Engine 407, to the Clarendon station in the days after the attack.

In October, Bonzano, the battlion chief, represented the Arlington County Fire Department at a Columbus Day ceremony with President Bush and the first lady at the White House. Also in attendance, New York Fire Chief Daniel Nigro and the family of the Nigro’s predecessor, Chief Peter Ganci, who died with his men at the World Trade Center.

``The evil ones thought they were going to hurt us, and they did, to a certain extent,'' Bush said at that ceremony honoring Italian-Americans. `` But what they really did was, they enabled the world to see the true character and compassion and spirit of our country.''

During the German raids on London and other cities in World War II, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill called British firefighters ``Heroes with grimy faces.’’ The same can be said for the firefighters and rescuers at the Pentagon on Sept. 11.

It can also be argued that the attack on the Pentagon had a profound change on the Arlington County Fire Department, and that the history of the department should be viewed from the perspective of before and after Sept. 11.

As Bonzano said in the Washingtonian magazine: ``Now you're much more conscious about what a call could turn into. You don't see what we've seen without some kind of scar. There's no such thing as a routine call anymore.''

The aftermath for the `Heros of Sept. 11'

There's an old cowboy song by Bob Wills and The Texas Playboys about healing entitled ``Time Changes Everything.'' On the third anniversary of the Pentagon attack, Arlington's bravest were still on the mend, as The Washington Post reported:

For Arlington firefighters who for nearly two grueling weeks led the rescue and recovery efforts at the Pentagon, the world after Sept. 11 will really never be the same. They may not have lost any of their own that day, but the 343 New York firefighters who perished in the World Trade Center weigh heavily on their minds. They know what could have happened here. It tested them in ways few could have imagined.

``9/11 was a plane crash, a building collapse, a fire and a terrorist attack all in one,'' said Dodie Gill, who runs the county's highly praised employee assistance program and has worked closely with its firefighters since Day One.

A few have paid a heavy price for what they did and what they and saw - haunted espacially by the images of severed body parts, of faces literally pealed away like masks by an intensity of heat that even veterans had not felt before.

``We deal with death and destruction all the time, but this was a different thing,'' said (Arlington Fire Captain Mike) Staples.

So was the degree of deeply strained or severed marriages, panic that twice sent one firefighter into heart afribrillation, an attempted suicide and, at last count, a dozen early retirements provoked by emotional aftershocks.

FIRST FEMALE FIREFIGHTER

The Arlington County Fire Department made U.S. history when it hired Judith ``Judy’’ Brewer as the nation's first female career firefighter in 1974. It was front-page news.

Brewer’s hiring set off a social and political firestorm. ``The wives were upset about their husbands bunking with a woman,’’ Brewer recalled in an article in the Dec. 25, 1990 edition of The Washington Post. ``I’m still here, so obviously the concern died down eventually.’’

Brewer, whose last name then was Livers, was attracted to the fire service while helping her firefighter husband study for his fire science classes, according to the group Women in the Fire Service Inc.

A number of women had served as volunteer firefighters in the U.S. before then, starting with an African-American woman named Molly Williams in New York City in 1818. What’s more, female firefighters valiantly helped to protect London during the German air raids of World War II - ``The Blitz.''

Nonetheless, many of the Arlington firemen signed a petition urging Fire Chief Robert Groshon against hiring any more women as firefighters.

Wives demand meeting

Their wives demanded, and got, a meeting with the chief and County Manager Bert Johnson. Brewer was quoted as saying, ``Everybody watched me, everybody asked everybody else, `What did Judy do on that fire? I knew this would keep happening until I gained their acceptance.’’ Brewer was also quoted as saying, ``The wives are extremely upset. One of them screamed at me and told me not to talk to her husband.’’

Brewer was first assigned to Station No. 4 in Clarendon. Accommodations for women were lacking at the firehouse. She slept in the same bunkroom as the men. There were no partitions, so she slept with her clothes on, Groshon said. She was allowed, however, to shower in private in the duty battalion chief’s bathroom.

According to a profile of Brewer in the Jan. 18, 2001 edition of the Arlington Sun Gazette, which was written by Ingrid Kauffman of the Arlington Public Library, ``When she applied for the job she was not interested in breaking new ground as a woman. Nor did she realize she would be the first. She just wanted to be a firefighter. … From the beginning she had to overcome a lot of opposition, from both her male co-workers who didn’t think she would be able to do the job, and from their wives, who were concerned with the sleeping arrangements.’’

Recalling those events of more than a quarter century ago, Groshon said, ``I knew I was sticking my neck out’’ in being the first to hire a female firefighter, but ``there were no rules that said a woman couldn’t be hired.’’

Groshon was also impressed by Brewer’s determination. ``She came in looking for the job. I told if she passed the test we’d hire her. She flunked the sand bag test (in which fire service candidates hauled sandbags to test their strength) the first time. So she built her own sandbags and practiced at home.’’ She passed on her next try, he said.

Brewer, who advanced through the ranks of the fire department during her 25-year career, retired in 1999 as a battalion chief. She helped open the door for other female firefighters in Arlington County – and beyond.

Groshon's Tenure

As for Groshon, who retired in 1978, it can be said he was at the forefront of the ``progressive firefighting'' movement in the U.S.

In addition to opening the door to female firefighters, Groshon caused a stir by advocating the use of safety yellow for fire apparatus instead of the traditional red. Paramedics also debuted during Groshon's tenure.

Additionally, Groshon was instrumental in the creation of a regional response plan, in which the nearest Arlington, Alexandria of Fairfax units are dispatched on alarms, regardless of jurisdictional boundaries.

TODAY AND YESTERDAY

"Jimmie" Fought (left) - one of the first battalion chiefs

Engine 110 - Rosslyn

The fire department is committed to mitigating threats to life, property and the environment through education, prevention, and effective response to fire, medical, and environmental emergencies. - Mission statement

Today, the Arlington County Fire Department - led by Fire Chief James Schwartz - employs more than 300 firefighters and civilian employees and operates 10 fire stations, a fire academy and a logistics center. Fire administration is located at the Arlington County Courthouse. The volunteers of the Arlington County Fire & Rescue Association assist the career fire department.

Annual runs total about 30,000. Emergency medical calls account for about three-quarters of the yearly total, generating roughly $2 million in revenue. (The fire department has billed for ambulance service for many years.)

In fiscal 2004, the fire department budget totaled $29.9 million, according to county budget documents. That was up from $19.8 billion in fiscal 1996. Federal grants increased in the aftermath of the Pentagon attack.

The fire and rescue budget for fiscal 2005 is $31.6 million, a 5.7 percent increase from a year earlier. The proposed budget for fiscal 2006 is $31.7 million.

During fiscal 2004, Arlington County Fire Department employment - uniformed and civilian combined - totaled 305, up from 267 in fiscal 1996.

The rank structure and chain of command is fire chief, assistant chiefs, battalion chiefs, captains and firefighters. (The rank of lieutenant was eliminated in the 1990s.)

Community Profile

According to the county government's web site:

Arlington is an urban county of about 26 square miles located directly across the Potomac River from Washington, DC. No incorporated towns or cities lie within Arlington's boundaries.
Originally part of the ten-mile square surveyed for the nation's capital, the portion on the west bank of the Potomac River was returned to the Commonwealth of Virginia by the U.S. Congress in 1846. This area was known as Alexandria City and Alexandria County until 1920, when the county portion was renamed Arlington County.

Arlington had an estimated population of 198,739 as of January 1, 2004, reflecting an increase of 5% since 2000. It is among the most densely populated jurisdictions in the country with a population density of 7,700 persons per square mile more than cities such as Seattle, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh.

County Manager Ron Carlee's proposed fiscal 2006 budget painted a picture of prosperity:

Arlington is once again extremely fortunate to have a thriving economy that has resulted in high incomes, low unemployment, and increased values in all classes of property.

Firehouses and apparatus

Each engine/quint company is staffed by a captain and three firefighters. Each truck and rescue company is staffed by a captain and two or three firefighters. Medic units are staffed by two paramedics or a paramedic and a firefighter. All firefighters are certified as emergency medical technicians (EMTs).

The personnel assigned to the field are divided into three platoons that work 24 hour shifts.

Each platoon is commanded by two battalion chiefs - one for the northside and the other for the southside.

Station 1 - Glebe Road
Engine 101, Medic 101, Hazmat 101, Battalion 111 (southside duty chief), EMS 111 (southside medical supervisor)

Station 2 - Ballston
Engine 102, Medic 102, EMS 112 (northside medical supervisor), Metro Support Unit, Ambulance 102 (volunteer)

Station 3 - Cherrydale
Engine 103

Station 4 - Clarendon
Quint 104 (Plans called for a new aerial ladder company, Truck 104, to replace Quint 104, a combination pumper and aerial ladder), Rescue 104, Battalion 112 (northside duty chief), FM 114 (duty fire marshal and logistics coordinator)

Station 5 - Crystal City
Engine 105, Tower 105, Medic 105

Station 6 - Falls Church
Engine 106, Truck 106, Medic 106, Ambulance 106 (volunteer), Utility 106 (volunteer), Canteen 106 (volunteer)

Station 7 - Fairlington
Engine 107

Station 8 - Hall's Hill
Engine 108, Medic 108 (part-time), Light & Air 103

Station 9 - Walter Reed Drive
Quint 109, Rescue 109

Station 10 - Rosslyn
Engine 110, Medic 110

Two other career fire departments operate in Arlington County - the U.S. Army's Fort Myer Fire Department and the airport authority's fire department at Reagan National Airport. Both of the departments work closely with the county fire and rescue service.

The Arlington County Emergency Communications Center - ECC - dispatches fire and police units and answers the county's 911 emergency telephone line.

2005 Priorities

Among the priorities in the 2005 fire and rescue budget:

Maintain timely, efficient and quality responses to requests for assistance from the residents of Arlington County by maintaining a sufficient number of trained Firefighters/Paramedics and officers.

Continue to implement the paramedic engine concept to improve response time to the increasing number of medical emergencies and the overall effectiveness of the Advanced Life Support (ALS) program; and improve training and supervision for all Firefighter/Paramedics.

Maintain an operationally and physically fit, safely outfitted, and adequately housed force of emergency response personnel through a comprehensive Health, Wellness, and Safety Program.

Continue to expand our Smoke Detector, Public Education and Life Safety Programs and the Confidence Testing Program for fire protection systems.

Enhance the information systems capabilities and technology applications within the Department.

Continue comprehensive ambulance billing collection and implementing a human resources system.

Maintain and enhance effective response elements for response to terrorism events and natural disasters.

Humble beginnings

Today's modern fire department had humble beginnings.

Organized firefighting in Arlington County began in 1898 with the establishment of the Cherrydale Volunteer Fire Department. Arlington, then called Alexandria County (the name was changed in the 1920s), was rural in the 19th century. Those first volunteers pulled their hose carts to fires. They didn't use horses.

According to Kathy Holt-Springston, Cherrydale's resident historian:

During the first few years after the CVFD was organized, the equipment (consisting of leather buckets, bells, and ladders) stayed out in the open. By 1906, a small shed (later referred to as "House #2") on what is now Taylor Street was erected to house the County's first mechanized equipment - a hand-drawn water and hose cart. "Engine House #1," another small shed with a hose tower atop, was completed on the grounds of the old Cherrydale School in December 1912. It housed the first real fire engine in Arlington, a 60-gallon pumper engine which was purchased by the Cherrydale Volunteers in 1913. In 1914, "Engine House #3" was erected in the Maywood area. "Engine House #4" was completed a few months afterwards. These buildings housed additional firefighting apparatus owned by the Volunteers, including a ladder truck and chemical engine.

Other fire companies were organized in the early 20th Century: the Arlington VFD, the Ballston VFD, the Clarendon VFD, the Jefferson District VFD, the Falls Church VFD and the Hall's Hill VFD. The volunteer fire companies were often organized under the auspices of citizens associations. Other volunteer companies served Fort Myer Heights and East Arlington (also called Queen City) but were disbanded before World War II. The Bon Air VFD operated for a short time as a division of the Ballston company.

Chemical engine

An article from the Sept. 5, 1923 edition of The Evening Star announced the formation of ``The Arlington Volunteer Fire Department, the latest fire fighting the body in Arlington County.’’ The Star reported a chemical engine ``of the latest design, carrying two forty-gallon tanks, with auxiliary hand tanks ands buckets’’ was presented to Chief Ralph Snoots by the Arlington Citizen’s Association and the Arlington Athletic Club.

In the 1940s, the Fairlington VFD was established. Because the county was racially segregated, the Hall's Hill and East Arlington companies were reserved for African Americans. (East Arlington, also known as ``Queen City,'' was leveled to make way for the construction of the Pentagon. A number of buildings in that old neighborhood burned in a conflagration shortly after they were condemned, according to old timers.)

The white-only volunteer companies formed an umbrella group, the Arlington Firemen's Association, in December 1935, as a predecessor to an earlier alliance called the Arlington-Fairfax Firemen's Association. That earlier organization represented the interests of fire companies in Arlington and neighboring Fairfax County. John Paul Jones served as one of the volunteer association's earliest and most influential presidents, and played an instrumental role in the effort to equip fire apparatus with two-way radios.

Volunteering was - and still is - a dangerous business, and at least three of the early volunteer firefighters died in the line of duty before the establishment of the Arlington County Fire Department in 1940.

Paid men

Arlington County’s first paid firefighters went on the job on July 15, 1940 though the push for a career force started in the 1930s, with the chamber of commerce, civic associations – and even the volunteer fire companies – at the forefront of the lobbying effort.

The county's first fire marshal, Albert Scheffel, was appointed 13 years earlier in 1927. Scheffel, who got his start as a volunteer at Company 1, was named Arlington County's first paid fire chief in the 1930s.

Newspaper accounts from 1936 tell of a campaign to hire full-time paid firefighters in addition to the volunteers who had valiantly served the county since the Cherrydale Volunteer Fire Department was organized in 1898.

``The county has come to the point where it not only needs, but must have a paid fire department,’’ said Munroe Stockett, a member of the Arlington County Chamber of Commerce, quoted by the Jan. 16, 1936 edition of the Sun newspaper.

Benefits of paid department

The Sun’s reporter added that Stockett praised the volunteers for their ``efficiency and voluntary service’’ but that ``he believed the county would save money by paying for fulltime firemen, since it would mean a decrease in loss of property, lowered insurance rates and increased protection of fire equipment.’’

John Malloch, president of the Arlington County Volunteer Firemen’s Association, also expressed support for a paid fire department but expressed concern about the cost – an estimated $14,000 annually to employ 14 paid men, or two men for seven of the county's stations.

Still, to some it wasn’t proper ``to ask or expect the young men of our county to give their time in our behalf without compensation,’’ said Walter Varney of the Arlington County Civic Federation, according to Sun on March 5, 1936.

Discussions and planning continued into 1937, 1938 and 1939.

Group of 18

Finally in June 1940, County Manager Frank Hanrahan announced that the first career firefighters – a group of 18 from the volunteer ranks – would go on duty July 1, 1940 after passing physical examinations.

Chief Scheffel asked each volunteer company for a list of candidates. Bureaucracy and politics being what they are, the men didn’t actually go on the job until July 15, earning a starting salary $100 a month.

They were assigned as follows:

Arlington: Carl Scheffel, William McAtee and J.R. Snoots. (Snoots later transferred to the police department).

Ballston: William Stoneburner, Harvey Smallwood and Frank Biggs.

Cherrydale: Elmer Marcey, George Robertson and Maynard Howard. (Robertson drowned off duty and Howard transferred to the District of Columbia Fire Dept., according to retired Battalion Chief James Fought.)

Clarendon: Charles Padget, Samuel Krigbaum and Julian Georgie.

Jefferson District: Lawrence Finisecy, Herbert Tyler and Clarence Bly.

Falls Church: Herbert Sterling, Herbert Knox and Dean Blood.

Racial segregation

None of the paid men were initially assigned to the Hall’s Hill station. (In the first part of the 20th Century, racial segregation was the rule in much of the country, and Hall's Hill -- Company 8 -- was staffed by African-American volunteers. The first paid black firefighters weren't hired until after the end of World War II.)

At least two of the career firefighters were expected to be on duty at all times, mainly serving as drivers for the volunteers. They weren’t outfitted with uniforms until August 1940 – when the county provided ``summer outfits of blue.’’ Hanrahan impressed upon the new hires `` the success of an ultimately fully paid fire department rests on the cooperation and success of this small nucleus of firemen.’’

When World War II broke out, the county hired more firefighters as the war effort depleted the ranks of both the paid and volunteer forces. In 1943, the county board raised the annual salary for third-year firefighters to $2,050 from $1,680, second year to $1,780 from $1,680, and first year to $1,690 from $1,540. Hanrahan took into account ``the cost of living and the salaries now being paid.’’

There were expressions of concern when the paid department started. All in all, though, ``A fine spirit of cooperation prevails,’’ Hanrahan said, stressing ``the importance of the maintaining the volunteer spirit.’’

1940s, 1950s and 1960s

The National Airport Fire Department, operated by the federal government, was organized in 1941, the same year as the airport. The airport’s first firehouse was located along Mount Vernon Highway. In 1943, a crash station opened on the airfield. (The federal government also operated fire departments at Fort Myer, the South Post of Fort Myer and the Army's Arlington Hall Station during this period.)

The county's only Gamewell Fire Alarm Telegraph ``pull boxes'' were installed on streets in the Fairlington neighorhood and rang directly into the Fairlington firehouse. Here's how the Gamewell system worked, according to a ``virtual museum of electronics'' called ``Reverse Time Page" (http://uv201.com):

Fire alarm telegraph systems came into use in the mid 19th century, and were a primary method of reporting fire alarms throughout the 20th century. ... The fire alarm telegraph system relied on the familiar red fire alarm boxes located throughout a city or town. These were the transmitters ... Each alarm box contained a code wheel which was unique to the particular box in which it was installed. When the alarm was activated, the code wheel turned and operated a switch. This transmitted the coded pattern over the telegraph system to the receiver (register) in the fire house which punched holes in a moving strip of paper. The pattern of holes served to identify which alarm box had sent the signal and, thus, the location. This register was generally used with a bell to alert the fire fighters on duty.

Fairlington's Gamewell system remained in use for many years but was prone to abuse. An entry from Station No. 7's journal dated May 5, 1961 read: ``3:19 p.m. Called Fire Marshal Shelton in regard to a kid that pulled Box 51. Gave him the child’s name and address. A little girl gave me this boy’s name’’ – Shackleford on watch.

In 1951, the county established its first fire alarm office. Police had dispatched fire apparatus. Before World War II, fire alarms were received at the central switchboard at the county courthouse. The phone number was CLARENDON 3200. Sirens alerted volunteers.

In 1955, the predecessor of today’s union, the Arlington County Paid Firemen’s Benefit Association, was organized by three of the career firefighters, according to retired firefighter Frank Higgins. Today, the union is called the Arlington Professional Firefighters and Paramedics Association, Local 2800 of the International Association of Fire Fighters.

In January 1956, Joseph Clements took command of the department upon Scheffel's retirement. Clements served as fire chief until his retirement in 1973. The rank of battalion chief was also introduced in the 1950s. (At first, the duty battalion chief covered the entire county. Starting in the late 1980s, two battalion chiefs were assigned to each 24-hour shift - a northside battalion chief and a southside battalion chief.)

In 1957, as the population increased, the number of house fires exceeded the number of brush fire and trash fires for the first time, according to Higgins.

The first fire stations built by Arlington County government, No. 9 on Walter Reed Drive and No. 10 on Wilson Boulevard in Rosslyn , were opened in 1957 and 1958. Over the years, volunteer-owned stations have been replaced by county-built firehouses.

Plans for a new firehouse to serve far northern (and affluent) neighorhoods - recommended by a 1959 insurance underwriters survey - were rejected by homeowners, according to fire department old timers.

The 56-hour workweek went into effect for the career firefighters in December 1962, with the introduction of the three-platoon system. The duty schedule consisted of four days of day work (10 hours), four days of night work (14 hours) and four days off. Before the three-platoon system, firefighters worked in two shifts, with longer hours on and fewer days off. The 24-hour shift went into effect in 1984.

Chief Darne remembers

Retired Battalion Chief Ralph Darne, who was hired in 1965, recounted his early days on the fire department in a presentation to Recruit School 52 on July 7, 1999:

In 1965, Station 7 was the slowest station, making a total of 163 runs – or a call every 48 hours. Thirty years later, Station 7 was still the slowest station, but it ran 1,425 fire and medical calls – almost nine times more than 1965. The starting salary for a firefighter in 1965 was $5,620 annually. In 1999, the starting salary was just over $31,000.

A captain and four firefighters were assigned to two-piece engine companies in the 1960s, with the exception of Station 7 where a lieutenant was assigned as the officer. In reality, actual staffing usually consisted of the captain and three firefighters, with the officer and two firefighters on the wagon, and a firefighter on the pumper. Taking into account leave and little or no budget for overtime, engine companies frequently ran with two men on the wagon and one man on the engine.

Ladder companies were assigned a lieutenant and two firefighters, but frequently ran with two men – one driving and the other on the tiller. Falls Church Truck 6, a straight ladder, frequently ran with a single firefighter.

`NOVA'

The Northern Virginia Regional Response Plan – NOVA – became operational on Dec. 15, 1975 in Arlington County, the City of Alexandria and Fairfax County, allowing for the automatic dispatch of the nearest fire and rescue units, regardless of jurisdictional lines - the ``mutual box.’’

Arlington County Fire Chief Robert Groshon, Alexandria Fire Chief Milton Penn and George Alexander, director of fire and rescue services in Fairfax County, signed the agreement on Dec. 12, 1975. Other fire departments have since joined the pact, essentially creating a regional fire department with more than 60 stations.

``We knew a person trapped in a burning building didn’t care which fire department rescued them,’’ said Groshon. ``We got to thinking here’s a guy hanging out a window three blocks from Station 7 and he’s waiting for Alexandria to get there.’’

Before the NOVA plan, the fire departments – at first through gentlemen’s agreements and then formal pacts – provided mutual aid on a case by case basis.

Early mutual aid arrangements

An old logbook provided by the late Robert Potter, a former president of Company 1, listed a variety of runs out of the county in the 1920s and 1930s. These included: Fire at the Luther Cleveland residence in Bailey’s Crossroads on March 8, 1928, a blaze at the Fairfax Apartments in Alexandria on Jan. 2, 1929, and a barn fire at the Lynch pig farm in Annandale on Nov. 19, 1930.

Mutual aid runs tended to stretch the resources of Arlington’s fire and rescue services, according to a Dec. 8, 1930 letter discovered by retired Battalion Chief Ralph Darne. In that letter C.L. Kinnier, the county’s directing engineer, told W. Glen Bixler, chief of the Jefferson District Volunteer Fire Department:

As a result of recent fires in Fairfax County, the question of taking the fire equipment out of the county has risen again. I will call to your attention the fact that before taking any equipment out of the county it is necessary to first secure permission from the supervisor in whose district the equipment is located or from me.

In case of receiving this permission only one piece of equipment is to be taken from the fire house and only in case there is sufficient manpower left to take care of any fire that might originate in that territory during your absence. I will appreciate it if you will see that this rule is enforced.

On June 11, 1929, a fire that leveled Veal & Walters’ garage in McLean in Fairfax County illustrated the demands placed on Arlington County’s fire companies. Cherrydale, Clarendon, Ballston, Arlington and Jefferson District all answered the alarm, and supplemented firefighters from McLean, Fairfax and Falls Church. Alexandria also sent help.

What’s more ``the Cherrydale fire engine sideswiped a telephone pole while making the run to McLean, but was not prevented from continuing to the fire,’’ The Washington Post reported. ``Jack Horner, a member of the Cherrydale department, was slightly injured. Horner was standing on the side of the truck that grazed the pole.’’

Tensions

There had been other tension over the years.

In the 1960s, Station 6 in Falls Church, staffed by paid personnel from Arlington County and volunteers from the City of Falls Church, spent a considerable amount of time in Fairfax County, drawing down Arlington County’s on duty force. Its apparatus and station were equipped with both Arlington County and Fairfax County radios – and Fairfax County never established its own Company 6 or Station 6 because Falls Church’s equipment made so many runs into Fairfax.

Of course, neighboring fire departments regularly made runs into Arlington.

The District of Columbia sent its Engine 5 and Engine 29 for a fire at the Washington Golf and Country Club in the 1930s, recalled retired Battalion Chief James Fought. The Alexandria Fire Department sent apparatus to the general alarm fire at the Murphy & Ames Lumber Yard in Rosslyn on Dec. 28, 1951. Companies from as far as Maryland responded to the devastating Pentagon fire on July 2, 1959.

Implementing the plan

The NOVA agreement itself met some opposition. Some firefighters voiced concern about the agreement’s impact on future hiring and staffing levels.

While all companies in Arlington County, Alexandria and Fairfax County are today ``on the card’’ for ``mutual box'' runs, the automatic response plan was initially phased in, starting with Arlington County Station 7 in Fairlington and Fairfax County Station 10 in Bailey’s Crossroads.

Both firehouses are located close to municipal boundaries. As a result, Bailey’s Crossroads is first due along the western stretch of Columbia Pike in Arlington County, and Fairlington is first due on a number of boxes in Alexandria.

Drills were held so firefighters could become better acquainted with each department’s apparatus and operations, and standard communications practices were put into place.

When the NOVA program was implemented, tactical calls were assigned to each of the fire departments. Numbers 1-49 for Fairfax County, 50-59 for Alexandria and 70-89 for Arlington County. The numbers 60-69 were assigned to the fire departments at National and Dulles airports as well as military posts.

For example, Arlington County Engine Co. 3 – Cherrydale – became Engine 73 on the air and in the dispatch protocol.

Box alarms

Alarm zones – commonly known as boxes (named for the old street corner red fire boxes) – were established to allow for efficient and uniform dispatching, with the first two digits of a four-digit ``box'' designator identifying the first due fire station. The Rosslyn high rise district, for example, was assigned Box 7002. Arlington County Fire Station No. 10 – Engine 70 – was first due. Or, in another example, Box 0147 denoted a Fairfax County alarm zone in the territory of the McLean firehouse, Fairfax Co. 1.

Additionally, a separate VHF radio channel – called NOVA (154.265 Megahertz) – was allocated as well to manage mutual boxes.

In an effort to avoid confusion, the radio designation of the fire alarm offices was aligned to the jurisdiction, i.e., Arlington, Alexandria and Fairfax. In the past, generic designations such as ‘’headquarters’’ had been used, according to Darne.

On Jan. 5, 1998, the tactical calls of the field units were again changed – to three digits – coinciding with the greater use of 800-Megahertz trunked radio systems across the region. Box designations, however, remained the same. Under the revised plan, Arlington County units were assigned 100-series calls, i.e. Engine 73 became Engine 103. Alexandria units were assigned 200-series calls, the airports 300-series calls, and Fairfax County 400-series and 800-series calls.

THE FIRST MEDICS

Paramedics - 1970s

Vintage Ambulance

Vintage Ambulance

Disaster exercise at Pentagon - June 8, 2005

Roughly three-quarters of all runs for today's Arlington County Fire Department are for ``medical locals,'' and the fire department operates seven full-time paramedic units and a paramedic engine company to meet the demand. A part-time unit medic unit is also on the roster when staffing permits, and volunteers operate an ambulance on a part-time basis as well.

The fire department's patients are typically transported to Virginia Hospital Center and Northern Virginia Community Hospital, both in Arlington County. Trauma patients are sent to Fairfax Hospital in Fairfax County, Washington Hospital Center's "Medstar Unit'' or the George Washington Medical Center, both of which are located in Washington. Burn patients are transported to the Washington Hospital Center regional burn unit.

The Washington Hospital Center, the U.S. Park Police and the Fairfax County Police Department operate "Medevac" helicopters.

Origins

The origins of the emergency medical service date back to the 1930s, when Arlington County's early volunteer firefighters started providing emergency first aid.

The Jefferson District (today Crystal City) Volunteer Fire Department organized a rescue squad in the early 1930s, and the Clarendon VFD obtained a 1935 Buick ambulance that ``ran the whole county from 1935 until 1947,’’ according to retired firefighter Frank Higgins.

Jefferson's heavy rescue – Squad 5 – contended with an increasing number of wrecks on Route 1, then one of the most heavily traveled routes in the Washington region.

In 1932 in neighboring Fairfax County, the McLean Volunteer Fire Department purchased its first ambulance - a 1926 LaSalle.

Other volunteer fire companies purchased ambulances, and for the next 40 years provided of ambulance service in Arlington County. Their members were certified in basic and advanced first aid skilled by the American Red Cross. Paid firefighters were also assigned to ambulance service in the early days, but often because they were in ``the dog house,'' according to fire department old timers. National Airport also operated an ambulance.

Ambulances usually ran with a crew of two - career and/or volunteer members - and yet it was not unusual for an ambulance to respond to a call with just one person in the day's before ``minimum staffing'' standards. To provide adequate manpower, police officers responded on all ambulance calls and helped carry stretchers, according to retired Battalion Chief Ralph Darne.

In most cases, casualties were transported to Emergency Hospital in Washington until Arlington Hospital opened in 1944. A community project started by five womens clubs in 1933 raised the money to build the 100-bed hospital. (Today, the greatly expanded facility is called Virginia Hospital Center.)

Until at least the 1930s, when racial segregation was strictly enforced, African-Americans were transported to ``black'' hospitals in Washington, such as Freedmen's Hospital (now called Howard University Hospital.)

Introduction of CPR

For Arlington County and other U.S. communities, a major breakthrough in emergency medical care came in 1965 when CPR - cardio pulmonary resuscitation - became widely used in hospitals and on ambulance across the U.S., according to the Public Service Training Center at Monroe Community College in Rochester New York.

Impressed, the medical community lobbied for non-physicians to administer more advanced care - drugs, IVs, defibrillation, intubation - in the field, and the first fire department paramedics went to work in Los Angeles County, California. (The 1970s TV show ``Emergency!" popularized the concept.)

California Governor Ronald Reagan signed the state's Wedworth Townsend Paramedic Act in July 1970. Reagan's motivation was personal. His father died of a heart attack because an ambulance refused to cross jurisdictional lines, Reagan was quoted as saying. Other states followed California and enacted similar legislation.

The first of Virginia's ``cardiac technicians'' graduated in Virginia Beach in 1973, according to the state's Office of Emergency Medical Services.

Arlington County followed soon thereafter during the administration of Fire Chief Robert Groshon, who was appointed fire chief in 1973. The earliest Arlington paramedics underwent intensive hospital training and operated under the auspices of Dr. Robert Ryan and other physicians. Groshon said the physicians lobbied for better pay for the paramedics.

The concept of tiered-response was also introduced, in which the closest engine company or truck company responded to provide basic life support prior to the arrival of paramedics.

The first medic units operated from old Station No.1, which was located about a block away from the intersection of Columbia Pike and Walter Reed Drive, and Station No. 4 in Clarendon.

`Scoop and swoop'

After years of ``scoop and swoop'' service, a national push was taking hold to improve emergency care. (In some American states, undertakers also ran the local ambulance service, using converted hearses.)

The first Rules and Regulations Governing Ambulance Services in the Commonwealth of Virginia were promulgated in 1969. In 1971, Virginia implemented the National Standard Curriculum for Emergency Medical Technicians. The state's first EMT-paramedics were certified in 1976. Some firefighters gave their comrades a nickname, ``Doctors.''

Advances in technology also helped pave the way for paramedics.

In 1968, Motorola Corp. introduced APCOR, a radio that allowed a continuous EKG to be transmitted from the field, according to the research from Monroe Community College.

The portable defibrillator also debuted.

According to Medtronic Inc., manufacturer of the device, battery-powered defrbillators and heart monitors ``changed the face of emergency medical care in the late 1960s ... The device revolutionized emergency response.'' In 1972, the manufacturer introduced the LIFEPAK® 2 defibrillator/monitor - ``the first portable defibrillator to allow transmission of the patient's ECG signal from an emergency vehicle to physicians waiting at the hospital.''

Some of the first portable defibrillators weighed 40 or more pounds, heavier than today's compact models - but still lighter than the first of the hospital-based defibrillators.

Another critical element in the evolution of the emergency medical service in the Washington area was the formation of the U.S. Park Police helicopter branch in 1973. The Fairfax County police added its rescue helicopter service in the early 1980s. Fairfax County had experimented with a police helicopter in the 1970s but that earlier program was scrapped.

IN THE LINE OF DUTY

UPDATED AUGUST 2008


Firefighters struggle to reach Capt. Archie Hughes


Hughes

Theodore

Miller

More than 40 years ago, an Arlington County fire captain was killed in the line of duty in a seemingly routine house fire.

Capt. Archie Hughes, 33, was the officer in charge of Engine Co. 4 on the night of Monday, Oct. 19, 1964.

Hughes got his start as a volunteer firefighter, joined the paid department, advanced to the rank of fire lieutenant in 1957 and fire captain in 1961. His father and brother also served as volunteer firefighters.

Hughes died alone in the attic of a two-story brick house at 2362 N. Nelson St. Four other firefighters were injured in the effort to rescue their fallen comrade.

Fire marshal's account

Fire Marshal Leslie Shelton provided this account of the fire, as reported in the Oct. 20, 1964 edition of The Washington Star:

Mrs. Thomas Sanderson was in a first-floor family room with her son, Richard, 12, her daughter Jill, 8, and her mother, Mrs. Hilma Chardavoyne, a wheelchair invalid, when everyone smelled smoke about 7:45 p.m.

At first they thought a cigarette had been dropped in a chair. They searched chairs, the carpet, closets and examined the television. Finding nothing, Richard went outside and Mrs. Sanderson went to awaken her husband, who was sleeping in a first-floor bedroom. Richard saw smoke billowing from the roof and shouted a warning to the family.

Hughes was one of the first firefighters to enter the burning house. He climbed through a trap door into the attic, wearing protective breathing apparatus and his turnout gear. It simply wasn't enough to protect him from the flames and smoke. (Later accounts suggested Hughes may have removed some of his protective gear to fit into the attic.)

According to The Washington Star: When he failed to reappear after several minutes, his men attempted to go after him, but intense heat made the trap door unapproachable.

Rescue attempt thwarted

Other firemen chopped and tore at the shingled roof in an effort to reach Hughes. They succeeded in making an opening, but a burst of air through the hole caused the blaze to explode throughout the attic, making rescue impossible.

Hughes body was recovered about a half hour after the fire was quelled. The loss of a firefighter is always hard on the department, but in the case of Archie Hughes the loss was especially great because he was considered one of the department's up-and coming leaders, a dedicated firefighter and a decent human being.

"If he had lived I'm sure he would have made chief officer," retired Battalion Chief James Fought said. Fought was Hughes' first captain when he advanced to the ranks of the paid department and was assigned to Company 5, in what is now Crystal City.

Flags were flown at half mast across Arlington, and the Northern Virginia Board of Realtors, of which Mr. Sanderson was a member, established a fund to benefit Hughes' wife, Eldina, and their three children, who were aged 6 years, 21 months and 9 months in 1964, according to the Oct. 21 edition of The Washington Post.

Other line of duty deaths

Captain Charles Theodore, of Engine 10, suffered smoke inhalation after leading his crew to an apartment fire on the fifth floor of the Tyler Building of the Arlington Towers project (now called River Place) on June 24, 1961. Theodore was pronounced dead at Arlington Hospital. Theodore, 39, joined the fire department in 1944 and was promoted to captain in 1953. He was married and the father of three children.

In 1967, Lt. Elmer Marcey died of heart attack at Station 7.

Firefighter William Miller, of Engine 70, suffered a fatal heart attack in 1982 after undergoing a physical stress test.

Responding to an alarm on June 13, 1943, Engine 2 crashed into telephone utility pole, critically injuring Volunteer Firefighter George Skidmore, 46. Skidmore succumbed to his injuries two days later at Emergency Hospital in Washington. Two other firefighters – paid driver Theodore Smith and volunteer Ed Riker – were injured in the wreck, which occurred during a thunderstorm. The 1931 American La France ``hit an oil slick on Wilson Boulevard between Wayne and Veitch Streets,’’ according to Higgins. Skidmore was vice president of the Ballston Volunteer Fire Department and had been an active member for 14 years.

Volunteer Gene Payne, also of Company 2, was killed in 1929 or 1930 after being struck by an automobile at a fire call, according to Fought. Frank Hinkins, a member of the Falls Church Volunteer Fire Department, was killed while responding to a false alarm in July 1934, according to the Falls Church VFD.

Motorcycle cop

According to the Arlington County Police Department, Motorcycle Officer Arthur Chorovich was killed on Dec. 5, 1964 while responding to a ``Code 3 fire'' in Virginia Square. Officer Chorovich's motorcycle was struck by another vehicle at the intersection of North Stafford Street and Washington Boulevard.

The earliest known line of duty deaths in the Northern Virginia fire service occurred in the mid-1800s in the City of Alexandria.

In 1852, volunteer Charles Glasscock of the Friendship Fire Company was struck by an engine. Then in 1855, seven Alexandria volunteer firefighters (six from the Star company and one member of the Relief company) died in a building collapse in the 100-block of King Street, according to the Alexandria Fire Department's web site.

Cancer has also claimed the lives of many firefighters. A tree was planted at Station 9 in memory of retired Battalion Chief Clark Berry, who died of cancer in 1999.

Serious injuries

Fire fighting and rescue will always be a dangerous business. A number of Arlington firefighters have suffered serious injuries. In 1929, Fireman Avenner Beales, a member of the Jefferson District Volunteer Fire Department, suffered severe burns about his face and arms in a fire at the Betholine Oil Company warehouse on Columbia Pike. ``A drum of oil exploded as he an another fireman were playing the hose on the flames,’’ according to a story in the old Washington Times newspaper that later became the Times-Herald.

Lt. John Walker, of Truck 79, suffered severe respiratory injuries in an apartment fire at 2111 Jefferson Davis Highway in February 1979 that ultimately led to his retirement on disability. On June 19, 1985, Firefighter William ``Dude’’ Harris had a close call when his air tank ran out at a fire at 1931 Jefferson Davis Highway. Firefighter Bobby Clark guided Harris to safety and Clark’s ``actions probably saved Dude’s life,’’ according to the fire department newsletter Fire Lines.

On Jan. 26, 1987, Firefighter Stan Browski was severely burned in a house fire at 728 South 25th Street. He spent weeks in the burn unit at Washington Hospital Center. ``In talking to Stan at the hospital the night of the incident, I came away with a very deep respect for one of our brother firefighters who paid a high price for performing his duty,’’ Captain Joseph Arbogast wrote in the fire department newsletter Fire Lines.

Less dramatic injuries - bad backs, broken bones, firehouse slips and slides, and simply wear and tear - have ended firefighters' careers, as have the emotional scars of dealing with death and destruction.

Then again, as London auxiliary firefighter and journalist James Gordon observed in a short story about the hardships of manning hose lines during the air raids of World War II, ``I'm still alive ... I'm still alive.''

Firefighter safety

In the May 2000 edition of the magazine Fire Engineering, Arlington County’s Daniel Bingham, a second-generation firefighter, addressed the safety issue after the deaths of six Worcester, Massachusetts firefighters in a warehouse fire in December 1999.

``Recently we were discussing the Worcester tragedy, and it dawned on me that the way we do business has changed little since my father came on the job 40 years ago. We still stretch lines into buildings, crawl down hallways, search for victims and extinguish the fire. During all this we hope to get out safely. If we are lost, we rely on the traditional follow the wall to the left, hose lines, rescue lines and so on – just like my father did 40 years ago. Leaders, fire chiefs, and union officials across the nation need to keep pushing for change. Union leaders should put more emphasis on funded safety officers, thermal imaging cameras, quality training, radios for all personnel and electronic accountability systems. These things have saved lives and make our jobs safer. It is sad and unfortunate that progress in the fire service is measured in tombstones.’’

In recognition of all those who have served the fire department, a memorial is located at Station 1 at 500 South Glebe Road.