By Erin Smith
The Lowell Sun
SPRINGFIELD, Mass. — Local firefighters arrived in Springfield yesterday to assist with search-and-rescue operations a day after tornadoes swept through the region, ripping the roofs off tall buildings and mangling homes and cars.
“The amount of damage out here is unbelievable,” said Billerica firefighter Chuck McDevitt, who worked in Springfield yesterday. “The pictures do it no justice. Just seeing it, you’re in awe. There’s 200-year-old trees uprooted and tossed around like matchsticks.”
The District 6 Task Force sent engine trucks and crews from Bedford, Billerica, Dracut, North Reading and Tewksbury, ladder trucks and crews from Lowell and Ayer, and a team commander from Lowell, according to Westford Fire Chief Richard Rochon.
Westford serves as the hub for District 6, which encompasses 18 communities from Andover to Shirley. The 31 local firefighters met at Cross Point Towers in Lowell at 6 a.m. yesterday morning and traveled to Springfield as a team, Rochon said.
As the firefighters worked their way through the streets of Springfield’s South End, checking on residents and shutting off gas lines, McDevitt said they found shredded wires and utility poles, and homes crushed by wind and trees, with the lucky few left standing without electricity. McDevitt said he noticed a family photo of a baby blown from a home and wedged into a utility pole in another section of the neighborhood. A lacrosse net from the high school landed in a backyard nearly two miles away.
McDevitt, who served as a firefighter in Lynn for six years before transferring to the Billerica Fire Department five years ago, said he’d never seen so much destruction in all his years on the job.
“We’re just checking all the houses to make sure everyone’s accounted for and everyone knows where their neighbors are,” said McDevitt as he worked in Springfield yesterday. “They’ve been in pretty good spirits, considering.”
Rochon said more local firefighters could be sent to the battered region as state emergency officials continue to assess the damage.
The district task force is part of the state’s longstanding emergency plan. Rochon said the district assistance system has been used more in recent years due to reduced resources in local cities and towns and larger-scale disasters.
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