By Evamarie Socha
The Daily Item
SUNBURY, Pa. — Put your hand in front of your face about an inch or two from your nose.
That was the field of vision for the firefighters going into the Northumberland County Prison blaze, said Dean Hixson, director and former chief of the East Sunbury Hose Company.
“We were this close, and I couldn’t see Henry,” he said of firefighter Henry Hullihen, who was seated next to him Friday. The firefighters, who went into the prison in pairs, knew the other was there by feel and touch, but that was about it.
Thick smoke, intense heat and cramped halls and stairways were just some of the challenges they faced Wednesday in what became a six-alarm, eight-hour response.
By the time it was done, the fire that destroyed the 139-year-old prison was out but smoldering, contained by an incredibly orchestrated response that used more than 200 fire personnel and 66 units from six counties to the best advantage possible.
Hixson, Hullihen and a fellow East Sunbury officer who asked not to be identified plus Chief Ken Kipple, of the city’s Good Will Hose Company, said the response was like most others for a large fire, but almost immediately, they knew this would be a battle.
“I said damn, this isn’t good,” said Kipple, who was at his job at the National Guard Armory in Danville when he got the call at 2:16 p.m. He first saw the smoke while on Route 11 about 10 miles from Sunbury.
At first, black smoke poured from the prison roof. “She’s cookin’ if she’s black,” Hullihen said, meaning the fire is in a free-burning stage with no suppression effort yet. He was the third firefighter inside, and prison staff members -- the jail had its own fire response personnel -- were surrounded by smoke with no protective gear.
“We were the second ones in and chased out the prison staff,” Kipple said, noting the staff had air packs on but not protective clothes.
When Hullihen reached the third floor, he said he nearly turned back because of the incredible heat and smoke.
“The door was open, but the heat and smoke was so intense, it was a death trap,” he said of the roof’s loft, a three- by three-foot crawl space that was between the wooden roof joists and a brick barrier.
Fire will go through the path of least resistance, the men said, and ideally, they want to attack the fire at its base. But they couldn’t get on the roof, and ventilation was a problem, so the fight moved to the air. Five companies with aerial ladders -- Northumberland, Overlook, Selinsgrove, Shamokin and Sunbury -- were called and rained water from above for hours from five spots around the prison.
The unprecedented response began with the Northumberland County Department of Emergency Services, which uses “box cards,” or Excel spreadsheets that detail which fire companies where have what equipment and decide not only who to send but who to keep on standby in case of emergencies elsewhere.
They all tune in to a designated radio channel and check in with the chief, who goes straight to the scene for an initial “360 assessment.” By the time the fire companies arrive, he knows what’s happening and where to send equipment and firefighters.
Commander in this case was Assistant Chief Russ Wertz, who manned a mobile command center from the back of a pickup truck. Kipple eventually met up with him.
“Mentally, you are going 100 miles an hour,” Hullihen said. “Sometimes, you just don’t have time to think. You just do.”
That’s where the staging officer helps keep things in line. Capt. Matt Lydic, of the Good Will Hose Company, was in charge of the staging area in front of the prison, gathering fresh crews to take over for crews that had been inside.
A simple yet effective visual system accounts for firefighters. Each person has two fire identification tags, a red one and a green one, both with as assigned number. The red tag stays on the truck, indicating that person is there and in the mix. The green one is put right outside the building, indicating that firefighter has gone inside.
The response was nearly flawless. For a fire involving six alarms, 208 inmates were evacuated and taken to other facilities without incident, aided by law enforcement from six counties. Not one firefighter was injured among the more than 200 who responded. All prison personnel on duty escaped unscathed.
“This was a big, huge call,” Kipple said. “We can always look back and pick it apart. ... But for what we did -- we contained the fire and no one was injured, no security concerns to the citizens of Sunbury -- it was wonderful.”
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(c)2015 The Daily Item (Sunbury, Pa.)
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