By Justin Merriman
The Pittsburgh Tribune Review
PITTSBURGH — Additional equipment from Pittsburgh, used for the first time under a merger with Wilkinsburg’s department, may have prevented the fire in the 1300 block of Wood Street from spreading to houses on each side.
Pittsburgh firefighters battled for hours yesterday against a wind-fueled house fire in the 1300 block of Wood Street in Wilkinsburg.
Several times, the companies that responded to the three-alarm fire thought they had doused the flames, only to see wind gusts as high as 50 mph whip through broken windows on the second floor of the three-story Victorian home and fan the embers.
Two residents were transported to UPMC Presbyterian, Oakland, and a firefighter was taken to UPMC Shadyside, an Allegheny County emergency dispatcher said. The firefighter was in stable condition. Conditions of the two residents were unavailable. The Red Cross provided assistance.
The fire, which began about 4:40 p.m., appeared to have started in the basement, then crawled up through the home’s thick walls, burning the second floor and attic, Pittsburgh Fire Bureau Deputy Chief Dan Hennessy said.
After the first two companies had responded, firefighters thought they had the fire under control. They had climbed to the third floor, ventilating the home by breaking windows on the second floor on their way up. A sudden gust of wind blew through the broken windows and the second floor re-ignited, with firefighters still in the attic.
The trucks parked outside blew their horns, signaling an evacuation.
“They had to exit from above the fire,” Hennessy said.
Once outside, the companies regrouped, conducted a head count and sounded the fire’s third alarm.
“We were trying to attack it from all sides,” Hennessy said.
Several times during the next two hours, flames would disappear and firefighters would again approach the building only to have to pull back when wind fanned the flames and blew them toward surrounding houses.
The fire finally appeared to be under control at 7 p.m., and firefighters re-entered the attic to douse the remaining flames in the rafters.
It was Hennessy’s first fire in Wilkinsburg since the borough cut a $7.6 million deal with Pittsburgh to merge fire departments. The additional equipment the Pittsburgh Fire Bureau was able to bring to the scene might have saved the string of houses on each side, Hennessy said.
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