On Wednesday morning, Tracy Williams, the assistant fire chief for the Westview-Fairforest Fire Department in Spartanburg County, joined other firefighters from across the state at the South Carolina State Fire Academy for a ceremonial bill signing for a law that will support firefighters in the state diagnosed with cancer. - PUB DATE: 10/15/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WIS-TV NBC/CW 10 Columbia
VIDEO: Before the age of two-way radios, police and fire call boxes could be found on numerous corners across the District of Columbia. The first installations of these boxes began as early as the 1860s.
Firefighter call boxes were connected to a central call station and emergency responders would receive a telegraph of which box to dispatch to. - PUB DATE: 10/15/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WUSA-TV CBS 9 Washington, D.C.
San Diego agreed this week to pay $3.4 million to more than 700 city firefighters to compensate them for underpaid overtime they should have received several years ago.
The payout comes six months after the city reached a similar legal settlement with more than 2,300 other city workers for the same kind of underpaid overtime. - PUB DATE: 10/15/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: The San Diego Union-Tribune - Metered Site
Coronavirus cases have been rising in Illinois and many of its surrounding states this fall as health experts brace for a second wave during flu season, and while testing numbers could play a large role in the increased numbers, there's another factor that may be contributing to the spike: the return to school at colleges and universities in the Midwest. - PUB DATE: 10/15/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WMAQ-TV NBC 5 Chicago
Being a firefighter isn’t what they do, it’s who they are.
“It is just something once you start doing it you continue and continue and it builds within you,” said Wayne Cosner. “Either you are going to get in and be in here a couple of years and, BOOM, you are gone, or it grabs hold of you and you become loyal to the system and it becomes a way of life for you. - PUB DATE: 10/15/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Richmond Times-Dispatch
A massive fire destroyed an apartment complex under construction Wednesday morning in west Harris County. At least one firefighter was injured.
Flames turned the morning sky orange just before sunrise. Heavy smoke could be seen from miles away.
Two four-story apartment buildings were leveled by the 3-alarm fire off the Grand Parkway near Katy. - PUB DATE: 10/14/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: KHOU-TV CBS 11 Houston
VIDEO: Every year, local fire departments and KSBY team up to visit elementary schools across the Central Coast for the Burn Relay to teach kids fire safety and prevention.
Due to COVID-19 and distance learning, the Burn Relay couldn't happen last week so firefighters with the Atascadero Fire Department got creative instead. - PUB DATE: 10/14/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: KSBY-TV NBC/CW+ 6 San Luis Obispo
When residential fires happen at night while families are sleeping, deaths are more likely to occur. Smoke alarms are important for preventing these deaths, yet research has shown that many pre-teenage children don't wake up to traditional high-frequency tone alarms. Researchers from the Center for Injury Research and Policy and the Sleep Disorders Center at Nationwide Children's Hospital conducted a series of studies to identify smoke alarm signals that would more effectively awaken children and other members of the household in the event of a fire. - PUB DATE: 10/14/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Medical Express
VIDEO: For the first time in the United States, a robotic firefighting vehicle was used Tuesday to battle a major emergency fire in downtown Los Angeles, officials said.
The fire broke out in a textile business and spread to an adjacent building, and more than 130 firefighters extinguished the flames and prevented them from spreading further. - PUB DATE: 10/14/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: KCBS-TV CBS 2 Los Angeles
VIDEO: Doctors will say some of the most painful recoveries come in the burn unit.
A Detroit firefighter just lived through a recovery and he has a unique perspective. He’s in charge of the department’s clown team that works to cheer up child burn victims. Firefighter Mark Taylor went inside a burning vacant home to see if there was anybody inside and that’s when the roof collapsed on him. - PUB DATE: 10/14/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WDIV-TV NBC 4 Detroit
VIDEO: A Riverside family's Halloween decor is so realistic that multiple people have made emergency phone calls summoning firefighters to the home.
To say Carmen and Travis Long love Halloween is an understatement.
They began creating their "Pirates of the Caribbean"-themed creation three years ago. - PUB DATE: 10/13/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: KABC-TV ABC 7 News Los Angeles
VIDEO: In his 15 year career as a firefighter, Lt. Stephen Curry with Roanoke Fire-EMS has never seen anything like the fire that happened on Bullitt Avenue in southeast Roanoke over the weekend.
A fire broke out around 5:45 on Saturday morning at a vacant house on the 700 block of Bullitt Avenue. As the fire burned through the structure, it started to collapse. - PUB DATE: 10/13/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WSLS-TV NBC10 Roanoke
The first New Orleans firefighters were furloughed on Sunday under a plan requiring six unpaid days off by the end of the year to help stem a precipitous decline in city sales tax revenue during the coronavirus pandemic.
The city’s furlough requires almost all 4,700 employees to take the six unpaid days, including police, firefighters and other safety workers, reducing their salaries by about 10% and saving the city $6 million. - PUB DATE: 10/13/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Nola.com
Just as predicted, the US is now grappling with a new Covid-19 surge -- one that could overwhelm hospitals, kill thousands of Americans a day by January and leave even young survivors with long-term complications.
"We went down to the lowest point lately in early September, around 30,000-35,000 new cases a day. - PUB DATE: 10/13/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: CNN Health
U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin says New York City will have to cover a $4 million shortfall to a program that helps 9/11 first responders pay for medical bills. The federal government removed funds to the World Trade Center Health Program to settle debts with the city over several years.
Attorney Michael Barasch represents thousands of 9/11 first responders and survivors. - PUB DATE: 10/13/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WSHU Public Radio
VIDEO: Jason Cortez, a beloved San Francisco firefighter-paramedic who was killed during a training accident last week, was knocked over a third-floor railing by a water blast from a valve he had “inadvertently” opened, authorities said in a preliminary report released Sunday. Cortez, 42, was participating in a training drill Wednesday when he was injured. - PUB DATE: 10/12/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: KPIX-TV CBS 5 San Francisco
VIDEO: An extra-alarm fire involving multiple homes in Chicago's Humboldt Park neighborhood Sunday night has left one firefighter suffering from minor injuries.
The fire started just after 11:30 p.m. inside of a vacant 2 1/2-story home in the 800-block of North Lawndale Avenue, the Chicago Fire Department said. - PUB DATE: 10/12/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WLS-TV ABC 7 Chicago
Across the US, coronavirus outbreaks seem to be larger than ever before.
On Saturday, 12 states hit record seven-day rolling average case counts, according to a Business Insider analysis of data from The COVID Tracking Project, which compiles data from state and territory-level public health authorities. - PUB DATE: 10/12/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Science Alert
More than three-quarters of FDNY employees who retired last year qualified for annual pensions exceeding $100,000 — with many awarded extra because of disabilities related to 9/11, a new study and data reveal.
Forty of the 491 retirees landed gold-plated pensions of more than $200,000 a year, according to the study by the Empire Center for Public Policy. - PUB DATE: 10/12/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: New York Post - Metered Site
They’re the first on the scene at major trauma events and this weekend, San Antonio firefighters, EMS and police officers were the first in line to give back to the community by donating blood.
Conrad Gonzales, a retired San Antonio firefighter, felt he needed to step up when he heard that the South Texas Blood and Tissue Center’s blood supply continues to be at an all-time low, due to the pandemic. - PUB DATE: 10/12/2020 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: KSAT-TV ABC 12 San Antonio
