Pa. Station Reopens Following Slow Response to Blaze

Scranton will reopen its shuttered East Mountain firehouse and bring back 12 laid-off firefighters because of a slow response time early this morning to an East Mountain house fire, Mayor Chris Doherty said this afternoon.

The administration and fire union have reached a pact today that calls for the city to rehire 12 laid-off firefighters, and the union will relax a court order requiring four firefighters per apparatus for safety and instead will operate with three firefighters per apparatus.

The result is that the East Mountain Firehouse on East Mountain Road will reopen Saturday, two more apparatuses will be able to be kept in service, and there will be less temporary "brownout" closures of firehouses, said both Mr. Doherty and Scranton Deputy Fire Chief Al Lucas.

The accord was reached just hours after Fire Chief Tom Davis acknowledged that a fire at a home on Froude Street would have caused less damage had the East Mountain Firehouse that is 1.2 miles away from the Froude Street blaze been open. Instead, the closest company was Engine 2 -- 2.9 miles from the fire -- at the corner of Pittston Avenue and Gibbons Street. Engine Co. 4, on Mulberry Street and 2.4 miles from the fire, was closed due to a brownout.

This morning's fire at 5:09 a.m. severely damaged the home and destroyed its attached garage, a car inside the garage and another car outside the garage. It took an hour to get the fire under control. About 20 firefighters were on the scene and no one was injured but two people are displaced.

The initial response time was 10 minutes for an apparatus traveling 2.9 miles from South Scranton, Chief Davis said. As minutes are precious in firefighting, the department strives for a 4 or 5 minute response time, or less, Chief Davis said.

"The response time (this morning) was unacceptable. It becomes a public safety issue," Mr. Doherty said.

Deputy Chief Lucas said, "I'm happy that the city and union could come to an agreement that will allow us to distribute manpower to decrease response times. It's a win-win."

The city had to find $400,000 to craft the arrangement, Mr. Doherty and Deputy Chief Lucas said.

As the city has already been paying two-thirds of laid-off firefighter salaries for unemployment, the city needed to find the other third -- or a balance of around $400,000 -- to craft the arrangement, Mr. Doherty and Deputy Chief Lucas said.

That funding is being cobbled together from various sources, including: $200,000 in savings on road salt from a mild winter; $100,000 in City Council funds budgeted for legal representation; and $95,000 in federal grant funds that could be used for any purpose, Mr. Doherty said.

Homeowner Alicia Sodano, who lives at Froude Street house with her sister, Eileen Sodano, said she was awoken Friday morning by the sound of pops, went downstairs and through a window could see that the garage in the rear of the home was ablaze.

"I came downstairs and as soon as I turned the corner, I saw flames," Alicia Sodano said. "I ran back to get my sister and two dogs. By the time we came down the stairs, we couldn't see in front of us, the smoke was so thick. We just ran out. The whole garage was on fire."

Eileen added, "If it was a few more minutes, we wouldn't have woken up at all," as they could have been suffocated by smoke.

When they got outside, neighbors were already calling 911, they said.

Eileen Sodano remarked that the siblings a week ago were walking their dogs and noticed the closed East Mountain Firehouse.

"I said, 'I can't believe they shut this down. What if something ever happened.' and here it is a week later."

The cause of the fire remains undetermined, Chief Davis said.

McClatchy-Tribune News Service