Madison Fire Department

Firetruck given to Alabama town hit by tornado

Dean Harbison set out yesterday on the longest firetruck ride of his life.

The fire chief from Cordova, Ala., drove out of Columbus late yesterday afternoon with a honk goodbye and a puff of exhaust, planning to arrive 10 hours later in the small Alabama city 35 miles northwest of Birmingham.

There, he and his lone passenger, a firefighter from his department, would alight from the truck and go to work in the condemned pharmacy that's been used as a firehouse since theirs was crushed by a pair of tornadoes in late April.

Their new truck was a gift from the Truro Township Fire Department, which worked with the Ohio Fire Chiefs' Association and that organization's Alabama counterpart to find out what equipment fire departments in the region need after tornadoes recently devastated the area.

The line of tornadoes that hit Southern and Eastern states from April 25 to 28 killed more than 300 people, more than 200 of them in Alabama.

"They had five of their trucks destroyed by the tornado, and I had a truck to give," said Chief Jerry Foltz of the Truro department, which serves Reynoldsburg and its surrounding area.

Township officials initially had tried to sell the fire engine, a 1985 model that was refurbished in the 1990s, but, even after lowering the asking price to $12,000 from $20,000, found no buyer.

"We had that truck on sale for a year and a half but didn't sell it," township Trustee Pat Mahaffey said. "At 26 years, we got a lot of use out of it and it served us well."

Harbison said the truck comes at a perfect time, when one of the two engines he has left is likely to be declared unusable because the roof is caving in. It's been a trying task to handle fires with few resources.

"We've been fortunate enough to be able to handle the situations, but it hasn't been easy," Harbison said. "We're used to having a seven-vehicle fleet. We're down to two."

The first tornado struck Cordova at 5:30 a.m. on April 27, an EF3-scale twister with winds of 140 mph that battered the city's core. Firefighters salvaged a few of their vehicles from their station and were taking a break from road cleanup when the skies turned black again.

The second storm spawned an EF4 tornado that whipped winds up to 170 mph and slashed a half-mile wide path through the city. Four people died, including a 10-year-old boy and his 12-year-old brother. The storm flattened the fire and police stations, erased historical landmarks, collapsed 75 homes and damaged hundreds more.

Madison Fire Department bristles at locked Capitol doors - Isthmus ...

The Madison Fire Department, worried that locked exit doors at the state Capitol could pose a safety risk to the building's inhabitants, is pushing hard for changes to prevent a possible tragedy.

"There is a sense of disappointment that there doesn't seem to be more urgency on the part of DOA," says Fire Department spokeswoman Lori Wirth, referring to the state Department of Administration, which manages the building.

At present, the building has just two working entrances, with weapons screening stations at both. The DOA last week assured the Fire Department that the Capitol's remaining six exits are all open, but an on-site inspection called that contention into question.

"We have a number of doors that are not opening to the outside," says Wirth, explaining that while one door at each exit is open, it is not clearly marked.

"If you're just having people walk out, they can try other doors," says Wirth. "But if you have a lot of people trying to leave at once" — as they would in any emergency — the locked doors create "a lot of opportunity for people to get backed up."

Wirth says it is "not a good situation" and clearly contrary to the codes the Fire Department would normally enforce. The problem is that the Legislature exempted the Capitol from local fire codes years ago. Still, Wirth says, "They have always followed our directives."

Until now. After confirming a citizen's complaint that some doors won't open, Madison Fire Marshal Ed Ruckriegel contacted the DOA's Robin Zentner, asking for changes.

"We did not get the answer we were looking for," says Wirth, adding that the department is continuing to follow up on its concern. "We've notified the Department of Commerce, which may have jurisdiction." And on Wednesday, the department wrote up the DOA's violations (see this story at TheDailyPage.com).

Efforts to get comment from the Commerce Department, Zentner or DOA spokeswoman Carla Vigue were not successful.

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