Story by KEITH ELLIS

On October 13, firemen from the White Settlement Fire Department were summoned to a commercial structure fire at 8203 White Settlement Road. A well-known and established business, Daniels Muffler shop was showing heavy smoke. C2 Jack Bell was the first on and declared this to be a working fire as he took command of the scene. Pump 3 was the first truck to arrive. They laid a 5 inch line to a hydrant about 70 feet away. Lt. Tim Rawlins and fire fighters Vance Scifres and SK Krenek made initial entry through the front door. Mike Cochran was engineer on pump 3.

The fire was in the garage area of the building. Command quickly determined there was great threat of the roof caving in and smartly withdrew from an internal attack. A K-12 gas powered saw was used to cut openings in the garage doors so firemen could access the fire. As 2 big boosters were taking aim at the fire from the front another was attacking from the rear of the building.

Once one of the overhead doors was removed it revealed a pickup truck was up on the muffler rack. It so happens this truck is known around the city as the nicest yellow Chevy low rider. The owner stated to me he parked it the building to keep it from getting rained on.

The fire was declared to be under control about 20 minutes after the first units made the scene.

The department also had opportunity to sharpen their Haz-Mat skills. It was noticed that the water run off contained a mixture of several pollutants, possibly anti-freeze and gasoline. A sand truck was requested so the firemen could build a dike to divert the water run off from the sanitary sewer.

The units that responded to this incident were C2 & C3, Pump 3, Pump 1, Quint 1, Utility 1 and Rescue 8. A total of 20 personnel responded. The fire drew a large crowd of on-lookers. The building was condemned before FD left the scene. Very little is salvageable. At this time the origin of the fire is suspicious.