On The Job - Chicago: Trapped Residents Rescued From High-Rise Fire

Jan. 18, 1996, was uncharacteristically warm and rainy for winter in Chicago, IL. In addition to the unusual weather, this date will be remembered by citizens and firefighters alike as the date of one of the most challenging fires in the history of the Chicago Fire Department.

Official Chicago Fire Department Photo Of the building's 500 tenants, 60 were rescued via ladders. Of the 62 people injured, 13 remain hospitalized. Four people died in the fire.

Situated on the near south side of the city about 1 1/2 miles east of Comis-key Park, the Lake Grove Village apartment complex was built in 1972. The complex consists of eight buildings, including 3555 South Cottage Grove Ave., a 10-story, 128-unit structure. That building is 75 feet wide by 250 feet long and is of non-combustible construction with exterior walls of glass and metal panels. The complex has been the scene of previous fires, including at least one "extra alarm" blaze, and is quite familiar to the firefighters of the 2nd and 17th Battalions who respond in first due.

In the early morning of Jan. 18, the temperature was 52 degrees Fahrenheit, the humidity was 86 percent with moderate to heavy rain showers and a strong gusting wind out of the south at 25 to 50 mph. South side companies were returning from a box alarm at nearby Michael Reese Hospital at 29th & Ellis when the Englewood Fire Alarm Office began receiving calls for a fire on the fifth floor at 3555 South Cottage Grove. Engines 45 and 16 and Trucks 15 and 4 as well as Battalion 2 Chief Miguel Bautista, were dispatched by loudspeaker at 3:25 A.M. First-due Engine 19 and Truck 11 were still occupied resetting the alarm system at Michael Reese Hospital.

Photo by Kenneth Herzlich/Video News Service Winds up to 50 mph hampered operations. Access to two sides of the building was limited.

The second telephone call indicated persons trapped on the fifth floor. Senior Fire Alarm Operator Michael Barry ordered the transmission of a full still and box alarm at 3:27 A.M., sending Engines 29 and 8, Tower Ladder 37, Squad 1, the chiefs of the 17th and 15th Battalions, the deputy chief of District 1, Command Van 2-7-3 and Ambulance 57.

Engine 16 was already on the street when dispatched and arrived quickly. As he arrived from the south on Cottage Grove, Lieutenant Alfonsa Johnson observed fire showing behind the windows of a fifth-floor apartment and reported a working fire. He ordered his engineer to supply the west siamese connection and entered the lobby with his crew and their high-rise packs.

Truck 15, under Captain Law-rence Koscianski, responded from its quarters with Engine 45 one mile south of the fire building on Cottage Grove. On arrival, Koscianski saw fire on the fifth floor and recalled, "it didn't look like anything we couldn't handle," based on the numerous similar fires he had encountered.

The complex was surrounded by an eight-foot-high chain-link fence, limiting access to the south and west sides of the building. Noting a wide walkway, Koscianski told his driver to place the rig parallel to the building, as close to it as possible, and raise the aerial to the people waving from windows on the south side. He took the rest of his crew into the lobby and with Engine 16 they made their way up the east stairwell to the fire floor.

While the fire didn't look unusual from the south side, it was a different story in the stairwell and the fifth-floor hallway. Firefighter Kevin Ryan of Engine 45, detailed to Truck 15 for the shift, observed that the fifth-floor landing was hot and smoky. As the crew of Engine 16 attached their 1 3/4-inch line to the fourth-floor standpipe outlet and prepared to enter the hallway, Ryan cracked the door slightly. Fire shot out over his head, backing all members down the stairs not only was the fire in an apartment, but it had complete possession of the fifth-floor hallway. The impact of the single line was nil and Engine 8, due on the box, stretched an additional 1 3/4-inch line under the direction of Captain Pat Brennan, still to no avail due to the heavy volume of fire.

Engine 45, meanwhile, had made its way into the north parking lot, its crew knowing there was a hydrant northeast of the fire building. Bautista approached from the north and saw heavy smoke emanating from all floors from the fifth to the 10th with many citizens screaming from windows across the face of the structure. He ordered second-due Truck 4 to place its aerial into operation and begin rescuing people who were threatening to jump. Bautista ordered an EMS Plan 1 at 3:34 A.M. to bring five additional ambulances to the scene.

Chief Richard Keating of Battalion 17, assigned on the box alarm, approached from the south on Cottage Grove and observed one window of fire. He stated that he didn't think it looked that bad from his position. Hearing radio traffic from Truck 4 about conditions on the north side, he quickly went around the building and saw the deteriorating situation.

After being advised by Keating, Bautista pulled a 2-11 alarm at 3:39 A.M. Chief William Malone, Deputy District 1, responded from his near Loop quarters quickly down Lake Shore Drive to the scene. He observed the heavy smoke conditions and panic-stricken residents. He later noted this was the most challenging life-hazard fire in his 34 years of service.

In the meantime, Engine 45 was positioned at the east end of the north parking lot and the officer and crew took their high-rise packs into the building. Firefighter Bill Heenan and Engineer Ron Schickel made the hookup to a nearby hydrant and also supplied lines to the east standpipe siamese connection.

As Heenan made his way toward the building, shouts from the east side indicated people were threatening to jump from the sixth-floor windows. Lieutenant Richard Chapin of Truck 4 had detailed three of his members to operating the aerial ladder and making rescues on the north side. He and his remaining member, along with Heenan and Schickel, quickly grabbed and raised Truck 4's 50-foot Bangor ladder toward the occupants on the sixth floor. This ladder normally requires six firefighters to complete the raise. It was nearly vertical when fully extended and placed onto the building.

Official Chicago Fire Department Photo Numerous occupants of the burning apartment building had to be assisted down ladders.

Heenan quickly climbed the ladder, finding it one floor short of four people threatening to jump. From the tip of the ladder, he saw two adults and two children in the windows above him with heavy smoke coming out over their heads. He tried to assure them that Squad 1 was coming around the building and would rescue them with its basket. Other firefighters were running quickly to get a 12-foot roof ladder to hand up to Heenan so he could climb up to the sixth floor. He urged the mother to hold onto her children and told the children not to jump help was on the way.

At that moment, the ladder started to slide to the side. As Heenan looked down, an 18-year-old female brushed by him as she jumped to the ground. Seconds later, Schickel yelled "look out" and Heenan, looking up, saw a figure come out of the smoke. He instinctively reached out with his left arm and grabbed the victim a 10-year-old girl in mid-air. The force of the impact knocked him down one rung on the ladder but he was able to maintain his grip. As he started to lead the girl to the ground, her mother jumped head first. The girl in Heenan's arms tried to grab her mother and almost pulled both of them off the ladder.

Conditions were continuing to deteriorate as panic-stricken occupants threatened to jump. Malone looked up on the north side of the building as Truck 4 was making rescues and fire was blowing out of the fifth-floor windows of the apartment immediately opposite the original fire apartment. By now, heavy fire was showing on both sides of a fully occupied 10-story building. He ordered a 3-11 transmitted at 3:46 A.M., followed quickly by an EMS Plan 2 at 3:48.

Fire Commissioner Raymond Or-ozco responded on the 3-11 and monitored the radio traffic. Noting increasing reports of trapped occupants, at 3:51 A.M. he ordered an EMS Plan 3 for five additional ambulances.

An additional aerial ladder was needed on the north side. Truck 11 was driven through an open grassy area and sank into the mud. Over 50 civilians quickly assisted firefighters in pushing the heavy rig. Its aerial was quickly put to work rescuing occupants from floors above the fire.

Fourth District Chief James Loughney had the Extra Alarm Citywide Duty. As he responded on the 2-11, he knew he had a severe fire problem as the 3-11 and the EMS Plan were requested. On arrival, he saw heavy fire showing from both sides of the building. From Malone he learned that one person had already jumped on the east side. He quickly established a lobby command post. A triage center was set up on the first floor to permit quick assessment of victims by fire department EMS personnel.

Brennan observed that while conditions in the east stairway were very close to untenable, they seemed to improve at about the time that the fire vented from the north side windows. Even with two lines operating, however, little progress could be made due to the heavy volume of fire. Members observed that the fire was white hot in the hallway, no doubt assisted by the heavy southerly winds. Koscianski reported back to the lobby and told Malone that the only way the fire could be knocked down would be from the exterior, as firefighters were pinned down in the east stairway.

Malone told Engine 61 to stretch a 1 3/4-inch line up Truck 15's aerial to the fire apartment. After ascertaining that all members had withdrawn to the stairwells, the Engine 61 crew was directed to attack from the exterior. They quickly pushed onto the fire floor and advanced through the fire apartment to the hallway. This was the turning point in the fire attack.

Tower Ladder 37 approached the fire from the south and was ordered to commence rescues on the west side of the building. The crew observed occupants on the fifth and sixth floors at the windows. After rescuing two people from the fifth floor, Firefighter Brian Rafferty raised the 95-foot tower ladder to the sixth floor. As he approached this level, a woman tossed her baby from the window and Rafferty, hanging halfway out of the basket, caught the child in mid-air.

Meanwhile, Loughney was establishing command and control in the lobby. Chief Ray Hoff of Battalion 4, assigned on the 2-11, was directed to establish forward fire command on the third floor and establish a relief area for the box alarm companies who were rapidly becoming exhausted. Additional 2 1/2-inch lines were stretched to back up the initial attack lines. The west stairway was designated for evacuation and the east stairway for attack. By this time, companies had advanced from the stairwell and together with Engine 61 were pushing through the involved apartments on the fifth floor and the fire was being brought under control.

Photo Kenneth Herzlich/Video News Service Firefighter Bill Heenan climbed a 50-foot ladder, finding it short one floor. As the ladder began to shift, Heenan caught a 10-year-old girl in mid-air and held on as the child's mother fell past them.

On arrival, Orozco ordered a 4-11 alarm at 4:11 A.M. with a special call for four additional truck companies and a 5-11 two minutes later. Companies on these alarms were assigned to search and rescue on the floors above the fire as well as relief of earlier-responding units. Searches of all apartments in the building were conducted by responding units. The incident was "struck out" at 5:19 A.M.

Post-Fire Assessment

As control was established, Orozco and his staff assessed the situation and conditions they had faced. The building had over 500 tenants, but only 62 were injured. Only 13 of them remained in the hospital after initial treatment. Over 60 persons were rescued via ladders. There were three fatalities in addition to the mother who jumped on the east side of the building. Two of those who died, a 10-year-old boy and a 42-year-old wo-man, were found in apartment 511, the apartment immediately opposite the original fire apartment. In addition, the body of a 20-year-old man was found in the sixth-floor hallway.

This incident presented the most severe problems to be encountered in fighting a high-rise fire, plus the need for extensive ladder rescues from the exterior, not a common high-rise situation. Almost all of the initial-arriving truck companies were committed to exterior rescue. Access to the building was restricted by fencing, landscaping, topography and parked cars.

As for the building, post-fire analysis revealed that the hallway partitions did not extend up to the bottom of the floor slab above but only to the height of the dropped ceiling. This created a "mini-cockloft" on the floor which, no doubt, contributed to the spread of fire out of the original fire apartment into the hallway and the apartments across the hallway.

It appears that the resident of the original fire apartment, 510, had left the door to his apartment open when he exited. The non-self-closing door permitted rapid spread of the fire into the hall. Coupled with the strong southerly winds, the fire was pushed like a blowtorch once the original fire apartment's windows failed.

The building was equipped with a manual fire alarm system consisting of pull stations on each floor but it was out of service at the time of the fire. It was observed by many of the chief officers that the building was equipped with smoke detectors in each apartment. These smoke detectors, however, were powered by batteries and it was noted that none of them were operable.

The ability of the Chicago Fire Department to mass a significant amount of resources quickly cannot be discounted. The total response to this fire involved 21 engine companies, 10 truck companies, one squad, five battalion chiefs and 16 ambulances. Without this massive assignment of equipment and personnel, together with aggressive and heroic firefighting, this tragedy could have easily become a catastrophe.

CHICAGO FIRE DEPARTMENT

5-11 ALARM FIRE
3555 SOUTH COTTAGE GROVE AVE.
JAN. 18, 1996

0325 hours: Still alarm. Engines 45, 16; Trucks 15, 4; Battalion Chief 2.
0327: Box 222. Engines 29, 8; Tower Ladder 37; Squad 1; Battalion Chiefs 15, 17; Deputy Chief District 1; Command Van 273, Ambulance 57.
0334: EMS Plan 1. Ambulances 35, 36, 38, 4, 19.
0339: 2-11 alarm. Engines 19, 60, 61, 39; Trucks 11, 8, TL 5; District 4 Chief.
0346: 3-11 alarm. Engines 28, 50, 49, 1; Special Units 2-1-7, 2-1-5, 2-1-3.
0348: EMS Plan 2. Ambulances 28, 41, 1, 42, 8.
0351: EMS Plan 3. Ambulances 11, 43, 49, 14, 50.
0411: 4-11 alarm. Engines 63, 18, 47, 23; Trucks 2, 16, 18, AT 1.
0413: 5-11 alarm. Engines 100, 65, 13, 84, 42.
0519: Struck out.

The assistance of Fire Commissioner Raymond Orozco and his staff in the preparation of this article is gratefully acknowledged.