The Wakefield Fire Department responded to 270 emergency incidents during the month of December including 35 box alarms and 235 still alarms.
The Department responded to four requests for mutual aid during December, twice to Saugus, and once each to Lynnfield and Reading. It received mutual aid twelve times in December, twice each from Reading, North Reading, Malden, Melrose and Stoneham and once from Woburn and Lynnfield. Wakefield Engine 2 covered Reading Fire Headquarters during the morning of December 1 during an incident in that community. The Wakefield Fire Department assisted the Saugus Fire Department at a working fire at 12 Guild Road during the evening of December 6. Wakefield Engine 2 returned to Saugus to assist that department at another working fire at 59 Holland Street during the early morning of December 31.
Firefighters under the command of Captain Randy Hudson responded to a report of a house fire at 52 Lake Street during the morning of December 2. Upon their arrival, they found a large fire underway on the second and third floors. The 3-alarm fire devastated the two-family home, requiring mutual aid from eight communities to extinguish it. There were no injuries as a result of the fire however the six residents will be displaced for an indefinite period of time while the home is re-built or completely replaced. The exact cause of the fire could not be determined due to the extent of the fire damage but is has been ruled accidental with the cause of the fire strongly suspected to be electrical.
Wakefield Firefighters Sean Giampa, Gerald Sancinito and Shane Brown received letters of commendation for their efforts in assisting a patron at the LA Fitness Center in Stoneham while off-duty during the evening of December 19. An adult male collapsed suddenly while working out at this gym and these men went to his aid immediately, performing CPR and successfully utilizing the facility’s semi-automatic defibrillator to re-establish a viable heart rhythm for the man.
Four Wakefield Firefighters, Sean Curran, Christopher Smith, Michael Long and Philip Preston were promoted to the rank of Lieutenant on December 28, 2012. The promotions were made as part of a re-organization of the department’s command structure negotiated as part of the recent collective bargaining agreement between the Town of Wakefield and the local firefighters union. The shift captain will now be assigned to a car and the four new lieutenants will be assigned as company officers on Engine 1, the headquarters engine. The change will meet National Incident Management Standards required by the federal government and will allow for better accountability and control of emergency incidents as the shift captain will no longer be both the company officer for Engine 1 and the overall Incident Commander. Many other departments of similar size and make-up to Wakefield already employ this system. All four men are experienced firefighters and the department looks forward to working with them as they start their new assignments on January 1, 2013.
