The Wakefield Fire Department responded to 248 emergency incidents during the month of October 2006 including 46 Box Alarms and 202 Still Alarms.
The most serious incident during October was a 4-alarm house fire at 29 Yale Avenue (Box 342) on the evening of October 27th. This fire had a tremendous head start as our only 9-1-1 calls were received from neighbors at 8:59 PM. First arriving firefighters under the direction of Captain David Myette found heavy fire on the first floor that had already extended to the second and third floors of the 3-story home built in 1860. Firefighters had to work fast to prevent this fire from spreading to the surrounding homes on Yale Avenue. Firefighters Brian Purcell and Joseph Nee, while conducting a primary search under heavy smoke and fire conditions, found the lone occupant of the home, Mr. Phillip Freethy, age 88, in a first floor hallway. Mr. Freethy was immediately rescued from the home and turned over to paramedics who worked feverishly to resuscitate him. Tragically, Mr. Freethy was pronounced dead at Melrose-Wakefield Hospital. The cause of this fire was determined to be accidental / electrical.
The fire department responded to 6 mutual aid requests during July, including Melrose (5) and Lynnfield (1). The department received mutual aid on 11 occasions in October, mainly to assist at the 4-alarm fire on Yale Avenue on October 27th from Stoneham (2) and Reading (1), Melrose (1), Lynnfield (1), North Reading (1), Saugus (1), Malden (1), Middleton (1), Woburn (1), and Revere (1).
October is traditionally Fire Prevention Month, and firefighters coordinated by Fire Prevention Officer Captain Paul J. Pronco and utilizing a gift from Alcoa-Reynolds Food Packaging Co., once again visited all of the public and private elementary schools with the Fire Safety House, an excellent hands-on fire safety education tool that has been very popular and effective. In addition, school fire drills were conducted in all school buildings and the fire department assisted with several school evacuation drills.
Training activities during October included:
- Training on our new “Blitzfire” attack nozzle – donated by Alcoa Reynolds Food Packaging
- Review of the use and operation of the Hydrant Assist Valve
Firefighters Richard Cardavelli and Marnie Sheeran began 12-weeks of training at the Recruit Firefighter Training Program at the Massachusetts Firefighting Academy on Monday, October 2nd with their graduation set for Friday, December 22nd.
We would also like to acknowledge two gifts to the fire department from Couto Management, the local Dunkin Donuts franchisee ($2,000), and from Irving Oil Company ($2,500). We are also very pleased with an anonymous donation that has provided the lettering “WAKEFIELD FIRE DEPARTMENT” over our overhead garage bay doors on the Crescent Street side of the Public Safety Building. We very much appreciate the support from the community.
In the area of Emergency Management, Wakefield was a significant player in a 15-community tabletop disaster exercise conducted on October 25th by the Mystic Regional Emergency Planning Committee. In addition, we have recently re-surveyed our designated shelter facilities with representatives of the Red Cross, and have been working with officials from Hallmark Health on a plan for a potential pandemic flu outbreak.
