Missy and I drove over to Fire Station 5 last week one night to visit with the paid crew on duty and while there, our pagers kicked off and in the few seconds before the dispatcher announced the call, firefighters speculated on the call being a brush fire, due to the dry conditions and the many brush fires we had been running…however when she started rattling off truck numbers, I said ” thats no brush fire guys, thats a structure fire “, and sure enough, she announced a house on fire, flames through the roof and fully involved…on North and South Road and just a few miles due west of the station. I had experienced some pain in my back earlier in the day, so opted to drive my own truck to the scene, rather than take a chance on driving a fire truck and possibly injuring myself further and prompting medical care provided by the fire district. Missy and I hopped in my pickup and took off, taking the back way to the location…the ambulance and fire truck and crews following me to the scene.

As I rounded a corner about a mile north of the location dispatched, I noticed the heavy glow in the night sky from the flames and as I pulled up in front of the house, this was what I shot with my camera phone….

..this was a duplex, not a house, and the right side apartment was fully involved with flames through the roof…

…Jimmy and Captain Dave paused in front of the house to mask up and activate their air tanks, waiting for the hoseline they pulled to be charged by Bill, the Engineer.

..they then took the line and went around to the back door to enter and attack the fire…I paused a couple of minutes to record the fire advancing through the roof….

..and the next image shows that they have started their attack as the heavy fire cools quickly to heavy smoke instead…

…I then went around to hump hose for them, as there were no other responders on scene yet and assistance was needed at the back door. As more help arrived and they started getting a handle on the fire…I walked back around to the front of the duplex and shot the personnel and truck images with great reflections on the driveway and street surfaces….

…and then walked back around to record the knockdown made inside the apartment…

…Bourbon Fire Department crews showed up and assisted inside with hooking the ceiling and pulling down the blown in insulation, as fire remained in the attic area …as this stuff was falling down it resembled big goose feathers floating down…

…I walked around to photograph the front of the house after the fire was knocked down…

..and the next one shows the duplex next door, saved adn spared by a well built required firewall in between the two apartments over the garages…had this firewall not been installed by the builder, we easily would have had two apartments fully involved on arrival instead of one….

Luckily no one was home at the time of the fire and we suffered no injuries on scene either. A suspect was taken into custody just a few days after this fire.