The Warfield Volunteer Fire Department has filed a lawsuit in Martin County, Kentucky, to get its repossessed firetrucks back. In May, First Government Lease Co. of Northfield, Ill., took the vehicles. Paul Graver, doing business as First lease Company and AA Repo East, LLC of Lexington, Ky., are named as defendants in the lawsuit.
- PUB DATE: 8/5/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WCHS-TV

A former volunteer firefighter has admitted to holding four colleagues hostage at the LaMott Fire Company in Cheltenham while armed with a handgun a day after he was expelled by the company’s board of governors. Paul Anthony Jordan, 27, of the 400 block of West Wellens Avenue, Philadelphia, pleaded guilty in Montgomery County Court on Thursday to charges of kidnapping, attempted kidnapping, terroristic threats, possession of a weapon and simple assault in connection with the 10:30 a.
- PUB DATE: 8/5/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Pottstown Mercury

Let me start out by saying that there is no such thing as a perfect company officer. I was fortunate enough to serve as a company officer for almost six years, and have been a chief officer for more than nine years. As a company officer, I was far from perfect. While I think I was a competent company officer during my tenure, I look back and realize that I could have been a much better company officer in so many ways.
- PUB DATE: 8/5/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: firehouse

Floyd E. Clark seemed to have broken a glass ceiling in 2011 when he was promoted to chief of the Ontario Fire Department, the first African-American to hold the top job. But Clark was fired in late June, an action he says was racially motivated when he complained about hiring practices within the department.
- PUB DATE: 8/4/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: dailybulletin.com

Facing mounting financial losses and a burned-out volunteer staff, Bath is prepared to end its EMS service for good. Instead, the borough's roughly 2,700 residents will be served by Bethlehem Township EMS, an agency that's no stranger to the borough, having served as the advanced life support service for more than 35 years.
- PUB DATE: 8/4/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Allentown Morning Call

A fire broke out Wednesday afternoon in the apartment of a volunteer firefighter who received a threatening and racist letter earlier this week. Firefighters were called early Wednesday afternoon to the blaze at an apartment house at 1096 Oliver St. in North Tonawanda where Kenneth Walker lives. When the fire was discovered, Walker said that no one was in his apartment, where he lives with his wife and their two children.
- PUB DATE: 8/4/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Buffalo News

It can come down to a matter of minutes. “It can be the difference between life and death” Chief Richard White of the Natick Fire Department told FOX25. In the Natick , there are four fire stations to serve 32,000 people and the average response time is below the national standard of 6.5 minutes set by the National Fire Protection Association, or NFPA.
- PUB DATE: 8/4/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: fox25boston.com

It's a warm, sunny morning at the Homestead National Monument of America in southeastern Nebraska. A burn crew dressed in yellow and green flame-resistant clothing is about to set a patch of tall-grass prairie on fire — on purpose. These kind of burns aren't unusual. But today's burn is; a team from the University of Nebraska is testing a fire-starting drone.
- PUB DATE: 8/4/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: kuow.org

The Montezuma Fire Protection District commission, confirmed to be under investigation by the Solano County District Attorney’s Office for possible open meeting law violations, met Monday to appoint an acting fire chief but took no action. Joe Rosewall was fired July 26 as chief. He could not be reached for comment.
- PUB DATE: 8/3/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Daily Republic

A new Fire Chief Search Committee will help the town administrator find a new chief after the abrupt resignation of Fire Chief David E. Zinther. The chief's resignation letter is dated July 19, the day after he last addressed the Board of Selectmen and asked for approval to hire a ninth full-time firefighter.
- PUB DATE: 8/3/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Worcester Telegram & Gazette

When Phoenix Fire paramedic engineer Kim Packenbush learned her daughter wanted to follow her footsteps as a fire paramedic, Kim was thrilled and scared. “I grew up with four brothers so I was pretty much a tomboy,” Kim said. Kim worried her daughter might have a difficult time adjusting to the culture of a fire station.
- PUB DATE: 8/3/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: 12news

The massive Soberanes Fire was caused by someone who lit an illegal campfire, Cal Fire unit chief Brennan Blue said Tuesday. The wildfire sparked in Garrapata State Park on July 22 before it burned more than 44,300 acres, destroyed 57 homes, and led to the death of a bulldozer operator on Green Ridge.
- PUB DATE: 8/3/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: KSBW-TV Salinas

Firefighters and fire officers who retired over the last 12 months will collect pensions averaging $119,866 a year, according to data released Tuesday. The Empire Center, a government watchdog, said its analysis of 15,556 former FDNY members determined that the pensions of new retirees — which already exceed six figures — would be increasing another 6 percent.
- PUB DATE: 8/3/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: New York Post

When Joshua Warren collapsed while exercising while on duty back in June, his death stunned fellow firefighters because they said he was a man who was health conscious. The reason he died also has them stunned. “Really couldn’t believe it,” said Mike Turner, an assistant fire chief at East Lincoln Fire Department.
- PUB DATE: 8/3/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WNCN-TV NBC 17

Omaha Fire Department Interim Chief Dan Olsen announced Monday that Battalion Chief Joseph Salcedo has been placed on paid administrative leave for sharing "inappropriate content on his personal Facebook page." The department released this statement: "It was recently brought to the Omaha Fire Department’s attention that Battalion Chief Joseph Salcedo had shared potentially inappropriate content on his personal Facebook page.
- PUB DATE: 8/2/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WOWT-TV NBC 6 Omaha

A six-member jury has ruled against a volunteer firefighter who sued for pain and suffering from the loss of his leg after being hit by a car as he rushed to an emergency call in Seaford. On Nov. 14, 2010, Steven Hochman was hit by a car driven by Kevin McCarthy, of Seaford, a retired NYPD officer. Besides McCarthy, Hochman sued his fire captain at the time, Thomas Cattone, saying Cattone had parked his pickup truck on the sidewalk across the street from the firehouse, blocking Hochman from seeing the oncoming vehicle, and the driver from seeing him step from the sidewalk as he hurried to the firehouse.
- PUB DATE: 8/2/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Firerescue1

A man who was days away from being voted in as an active member of the Francestown Fire Department died over the weekend after suffering a medical emergency. Francestown officials said Cole Wohle, 18, died Saturday night in Vermont. He recently graduated from high school and was a member of the Fire Department's Explorer Program.
- PUB DATE: 8/2/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WMUR-TV ABC 9 Manchester

Crews battled a large structure fire near the Loop 101 and Tatum Boulevard in Phoenix early Tuesday morning. The second-alarm fire started around 3:30 a.m. at a hotel under construction behind a Holiday Inn Express. Eighty firefighters were working the fire. The glow of the fire could be seen for miles.
- PUB DATE: 8/2/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: CBS 5 AZ KPHO

The sirens sound the same, but the fire engine serving Cherry Valley the past few days is dressed with a Rockford Fire Department logo. Blame it on the curse of three. For the Cherry Valley Fire Protection District, the curse struck when its trio of fire engines all wound up in the shop. "Everything broke at the same time, it seems," said Allen Geeser, battalion fire chief for the district.
- PUB DATE: 8/2/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Rockford Register Star

Four firefighters were burned in a backdraft that erupted during a blaze Sunday afternoon at a West Side residential building. The fire, in the 4900 block of West Potomac Avenue in the city’s Austin neighborhood, had been extinguished as of about 12:30 p.m., according to the Chicago Fire Department.
- PUB DATE: 8/1/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: chicago tribune