Jolly Mill near Pierce City, Missouri….

Posted on July 18, 2010 by jwj

The second day of my Arkansas vacation began with me driving down to Jolly Mill, located just west of Pierce City, Missouri and just south of Highway 60…its one of those water mills built before the Civil War that miraculously escaped the harm and wrath of the war and was restored by a group of concerned citizens a few years ago too. I photographed several old mills several years ago, and there are some websites and books devoted to old mills across the country and around the world. I like to photograph old mills and old barns that are well taken care of, they make great backdrops for modeling work too.

I had talked to a young guy who lives just south of Jolly Mill and he agreed to meet me there Saturday morning and shoot some photos with me, so I pulled in about 8:15 am and not seeing him there, turned Missy loose in the parking lot for a few minutes while I got my camera and prepared to shoot the old mill. There were a few fly fishermen in the stream, which is Capps Creek, spring fed and runs into Shoal Creek which feeds Grand Falls at Joplin, and is maintained by the Conservation Department who stocks it with brown trout for the fishermen. There is an old steel truss bridge on either end above and below the Mill and there is a high water manmade dam next to the mill that creates the millpond just above the mill…

…and a big ole Sycamore tree right behind the mill blocks pretty much any view from the millside of the stream below it too…the main problem with photographing the mill, I found out, is that the property on the other side of the mill is marked private, no trespassing, and that would be the ideal position to be to photograph it properly, but I decided not to put my waders on nor venture over to the other side. I`m big on getting reflections in my photos when possible, but opted against it this time. I settled for what I could get on the parking lot side of the mill. Due to the millpond there is a split in the creek so one can get some reflections of the mill itself in this smaller creek from the millside…

and then if you walk around to the east side of the mill, the group that restored the mill, built a concrete walkway to the dam and this is the view from the end of it by the dam…

..a nice view of the back of the mill…

About 8:30 am, Derek and his brother Nicholas showed up and found me photographing the mill from the little creek and using some of my filters on the photos….after talking a bit, we started shooting. I explained to both of them how I used to photograph old mills and would incorporate guys into the scenes in overalls or holie jeans, sometimes just sitting or standing next to the mill, leaning into the walls, or even sitting out on the dam or edge of the millrace by the mill, fishing with a cane pole and bobber…so Derek put on some overalls and we started shooting….for someone who had never modeled before, Derek took to it like a duck takes to water….

the reflections on the creek down in this light were a bit dull…so we walked over and shot some photos up against the mill building itself and around to the side…

…and upstream from the mill is a neat footbridge, where I took a few extra shots of him before heading south to Arkansas….

Arkansas Family Reunion and Quartz…

Posted on July 12, 2010 by jwj

Hey All, just got back from a week in Arkansas near Hot Springs…drove down for the July 4th weekend for a family reunion and some hiking with my dog Missy, and took my family quartz crystal hunting as well. I had a few shoots along the way at some pretty waterfall…one of which was Grand Falls, seen here at sunset Friday the 2nd of July….the widest waterfall in the midwest and very pretty at anytime of year, fed by Shoal Creek on the west side of Joplin, Missouri.

I left Joplin the next morning and drove southeast to Jolly Mill, just west of Pierce City and south of Highway 60, and photographed the old building which has been restored by community members and the millrace dam and stream, which is now a trout stream popular with flyfishing enthusiasts. I like old mills too.

This mill is hard to photograph from the mill side of the stream, one almost would need to don waders and wade out to the middle of the stream or the far bank to get a really good shot of it, as the land on the opposite side of the stream is posted and private. There are also two old steel bridges on each side of the mill, one is part of the Jolly Mill Park and open to walk across and the other is privately owned and upstream from the mill. I decided to try to do some rockhunting on the way down Hwy 71 south of Neosho, stopping along the roadcuts near the Pineville exit to confirm reports of dolomite and calcite but I couldn`t locate anything on the west side of the cuts just south of the exit. I didn`t have time to turn around and check the east side cuts on the northbound side at the time, figured I would catch it on the way back, but that idea didn`t work out for me at all. I arrived in Arkadelphia, where I spent the week and drove over to meet some friends in Hot Springs for supper and they showed me a new waterfall south of town called the Cool Pool Falls…..

….and then I drove back to Hot Springs and prepared to photograph the fireworks over Lake Hamilton there. After checking the area, I decided to photograph the show from the Hwy 7 bridge on the south side by the Clarion Hotel, who had graciously given me permission to shoot the show from their parking lot and boy was it a nice and colorful show over the water. I set up on the side of the bridge among many tourists from all over the country, there for their first time and while it wasn`t my first time to visit Hot Springs, it was def my first time to photograph the fireworks there, as I usually photograph the fireworks at the St Louis VP Fair by the Arch. I set up my camera and tripod around 8 pm and waited with everyone else for darkness, and several people showed up on both sides of the bridge for the best seat in the house, in their boats.

….and eventually even more boaters showed up, and as darkness fell, it became apparent that there were hundreds of boats on either side of the bridge, lit up by their parking lights.

….and right before the show began, it became downright crowded on the water….

…...but as I said, they had the best seat in the house, as the fireworks were fired from the peninsula on the right side of my first photo showing the boats gathering, at the Power Boats of Lake Hamilton`s boat docks. I wasn`t really sure what to expect of this show, but I can tell you one thing, I was sure not disappointed at all, a very nice show to behold and observe and photograph. For more photos, take a look at the next blog post.

Sunday morning, Missy and I headed over to Miller Mountain Mine to scout it out and find some quartz crystals.

I paid my ten dollar fee and started digging in one of the fifteen new piles that the bucket driver brought up from the mines that morning and right away, started finding smokey colored crystals. I also found a couple of clusters nicely sized…

….and…

A couple next to me introduced themselves as Mark and Carol and turned out to be from the Joplin area. Mark took me over to his truck and showed me a nice large cluster he found in the clay in one of the piles that morning before I arrived, that had several large points sticking out of the clay…

….and a closer view of it…

They were pulling several nice single points and small clusters out of their pile all day long.

I originally intended to stay til about 2 pm, but had so much fun and found so much material, I stayed and dug til 5 pm. Finally around 4 pm, I got up and took my second walk around and found so much more small clusters and single points up on top of the pile than I had found digging in the pile all day. While there, a few families came up that had started their morning off digging at Ron Coleman`s mine and found only a few crystals after four hours of digging. Three people told us that in three days time, not one new load of dirt had been brought up out of that mine for anyone to dig through and one guy had been there all three days. He said he had found more in three afternoons at Miller Mountain and would return the next time to it instead. I filled four bags on Sunday, with high hopes for Tuesday. As I headed back to the hotel, and crossed De Gray Lake over the dam, I saw some very interesting looking clouds and a rainshower…it looked like an approaching storm, so I turned around to shoot it as it was coming in across the lake from the west….

I then put a filter on my lens to make the clouds stand out more….

On Monday, we took family reunion photos at the rear of the De Gray Lake State Park Lodge, which provides a very scenic area in which to shoot from and around in as you can tell from the following photos…..

this is most of my mom`s side of the family, with relatives from both her mother`s and father`s side there for a few days of visiting. The island in the background is where the fire departments there, shoot the fireworks display from on July 4th. All of the larger lakes down there host their own large fireworks display each year, shooting them on different nights so folks can travel around and enjoy them all. While we were out there shooting, we had to take a few breaks for speedboats and water surfers whizzing by….

This is my Mom with her sisters and brothers….

…and my Mom with my cousin Vanessa, and the reunion cake….

On Tuesday, twenty of my cousins loaded up with my parents and we caravanned to Miller Mountain Mine for a day of crystal collecting…Bill and Faith, the caretakers there, gave us a group discount on the adult price, with several from California and Wisconsin along this year that had traveled down for the reunion.

One of my California cousins is a water specialist for his city and he brought his Honda truck so he could load it down with quartz for the trip home. I helped him locate a few yard rocks for his rock gardens and he actually found some nice specimens as well while there.

The weather down there all week was hot and steamy, and Tuesday was no exception, it got hot real fast and several of our group tired of the heat and left by noon. One of my uncles is a retired geophysicist, who taught at Washington University in St Louis, he and his wife went with us and I helped him locate a few bigger boulders so he could trim a few crystal corners off to take home. Bill was a little more prepared for the heat and dug alittle and walked a little all day like I did, and found a bag full of crystals. Here he is seen putting on suntan lotion and wearing a big straw hat…

Joann, his wife, also found several nice crystals and clusters and filled half a bag herself. A lot of my cousins were first timers to quartz, having traveled down to the diamond mine state park three years ago on our reunion trip at DeGray Lake Park for the first time, and wasted their time, finding very little of anything there that day. They sure didnt waste their time on Tuesday and left very happy with their finds. After helping everyone find some nice goodies, making sure no one went home unhappy, I was able to find a few gems myself. While I was walking around on top, the dozer guy came up on top and started moving some piles around, so we backed off and let him rework the piles and then sifted thru afterwards. Thats when I found these nice ones…

and….

…and…

I then walked to the west end and turned a large rock over, as Docia has reminded me several times, turn the flat ugly side over to see whats on the dirt side, and this is what I found…

so now I have my hands full, digging tool and bag of rocks in one hand, scoop this baby up and start walking to the truck and then I look down and see this beauty sitting on the floor of the pile in just a little bit of clay dust….

and anyone that knows me, and knows that all I look for is pretty stuff, knows that I just couldn`t pass this one up either…so I stopped and re-positioned everything so that nothing got mashed, including my fingers…and toiled on toward the truck. Luckily I made it without any damage to anything or me. Before leaving, I purchased two baskets of uncleaned quartz crystals, one for me and one for my cousin from California…Bill helped me load the baskets and as we walked out of the cool office hut into the heat, we were both amazed to see a full size Chevy Suburban drive up the steep gravel road pulling a 35 foot long Holiday Rambler camping trailer…loaded down with a kayak on top of it and occupied by six rockhounds from Georgia no less…and no easy feat in itself at all…the road up Miller Mountain, for anyone who hasn`t been there, is up a very steep angle and no room to pass another vehicle, nor any place to turn around until you reach the top. I`m still wondering where he turned that rig around when they left. Wow…

On the way back to De Gray Lake, I came across this beautiful scene along Hwy 7 south of Hot Springs and stopped to photograph it…

Wednesday was a shopping day for those who wanted to go and Thursday was a free day for those that stayed that long. My California cousin John, went shopping with some of the others and visited a flea market in Hot Springs. John is also a collector of old fishing lures it turns out and he found several at one of the booths there. He also spotted a nice old cluster of large quartz crystals on the seller`s desk and was able to purchase it from the guy for thirty five bucks ! After he showed it to me that evening before dinner, he asked me what I thought it cost him and I estimated its worth at about one hundred fifty to two hundred, rock shop pricing wise, and then he told me what he bought it for. What a buy ! John and several of my cousins left early Thursday morning and about mid morning I stopped to visit a quartz crystal hunter and dealer friend of mine who lives in the area. I met Mike there three years ago when I was at the first family reunion at De Gray Lake and we became good friends..he gave me some great information on mines to visit and dig at in Mt Ida and some to avoid, and was able to steer me to come great locations to dig Arkansas Herkimers and green chloride quartz as well. Seems Mike had been digging and finding some very nice clusters of quartz crystals on Wednesday at one of the Mt Ida mines and showed me just a few of the eight, five gallon buckets of material he had found in one pocket. I was totally floored by the color and clarity of the crystals, and most of the clusters were medium to large in size, with a few smaller pristine clusters as well. While there, Mike told me he had a little problem…. he had too many crystals and asked me if I would help him by taking some home…..it only took me about five seconds to decide that I could make enough room in my pickup bed to accommodate his request. I was able to help him create some new room for his new conquests by clearing off one complete rack for him, about five buckets worth, and yes, Virgil, I wrapped them very carefully before I loaded them up in my truck. Mike even helped me wrap them.

Here is a sunset I shot from near the park Lodge Wed evening on my way to supper there….

I came home Friday evening… long drive from down there… with a few hundred pounds of quartz crystals, including one enhydro crystal that Mike gave me, and plans to return to a certain mine in the Mt Ida area in October and possibly even November when I return for my fall trips. If anyone is planning a trip down to the Hot Springs/Mount Ida areas for quartz crystal hunting, give me a shout and I`ll let you know some areas to go to for great material. I`m planning to photograph my finds tomorrow and post more pics here…so stay tuned…

Park Hills Rock and Gem Show

Posted on June 24, 2010 by jwj

Wow the last two weeks have been long and tough, and I`m a bit behind on keeping up here…but Docia and I went to the Park Hills, Missouri Rock and Gem Show the weekend after Kentucky, for our second show this summer. This time we decided to use a trailer to show off our druse and prayed for sunshine once again. This was a Friday, Saturday, and Sunday show and since I was off Wed and Thursday, I took Friday and Saturday off from my work to attend the show. My mom asked if she could go and help, she wanted to see what the rocks shows were like and wanted to see Docia again as well. We got up bright and early both days and headed down there after I loaded up the truck with the flats of smaller rocks and two plastic tubs of the larger crystals all wrapped up in towels. That`s the real work of the show, wrapping them, loading them, and then unloading them and setting the booth up. Now I know what John Cornish goes thru each year at the Denver and Tucson Show, only on a much larger scale there.

Mom and I arrived about five minutes behind Docia and Floyd Friday morning around 8:00 am…and found them busy scurrying around setting their table up and moving things around. After stopping at the gate and visiting with Betty and Lloyd Marler, who do a fantastic job of setting this show up year after year, we drove on down and backed into our parking spot next to Docia and Floyd`s suburban. Floyd helped me set up the tables and unload my truck and then we moved things around some more to allow folks room to move around freely.

This is the view of the Vendor Area to the east of us with the old Federal Mine on the far side of the area. This booth next to us in the foreground is the guy from Keokuk, Iowa, but he had an assortment of specimens from all over.

This is the Vendor area looking the other way on the other side of us, to the west, am guessing there were probably fifty to sixty vendors there that weekend.

this is the view to the south, and John Beerhalters booth next to the white van, my friend who is an Arkansas Quartz Dealer at Mount Ida….

Here is our trailer and booth set up from the back looking to the front…..

Here is the view from behind of our tables and Docia helping a young man playing the spin the wheel game and win a rock, and my mom sitting under her umbrella….

and here is my mom sitting under her umbrella from the front of our booth space, the trailer behind and Floyd and Docia sitting in the shade of their suburban. We had brought along a canopy tarp tent, but the stakes that came with it wouldn`t hold it down with the wind blowing the way it was Friday. There were storms forecast to come up that way by 5 pm, but they never did get close to us, we watched the clouds swirl around us all day long. Despite there being little sun that day, Mom and I both got sunburned lightly on our arms and my face.

The crowd was light Friday, one bus full of school children from West County School showed up and a few folks from the local area bought a few pieces of druse from us and that was it. We heard it was gonna be sunny and hot the next day so Floyd devised a plan for the canopy on Saturday.

We set the trailer out in front prominently this time and put our tables off on either side at an angle so that people wouldnt trip over the trailer hitch and could more easily view all the merchandise. We tied one side of the canopy tarp to our vehicles and then Floyd brought along some heavier duty stakes and we tied the tarp down to those, and they worked much better. Talk about a nice shady area all day long. Thanks Floyd !

Here is the booth up closer.

Here is my friend John`s booth with large quartz crystals out in front on pallets…some of those babies weighed a couple of hundred pounds apiece…great yard rocks…he always has some beautiful stuff…we got word from my Dad that morning about the tragedy that occurred the night before near Glenwood, Arkansas, which is just south of where John lives in Mt Ida..and an area that I have photographed in the fall seasons in the past few years. Our hearts and prayers go out to those families and rescuers involved.

Saturday the crowds were heavy in the morning and cooler hours but by afternoon, the crowds had thinned considerably and little sales were happening anywhere within the vendor area.

This was my table of crystals, druse quartz, calcite and some fluorite from Kentucky.

This was Docia`s eye catcher, a large plate of soda straw druse, and boy did it catch some attention all day long, sparkling in the hot sun…

and her table all set up as well.

this was the Christmas Gem Tree she had set up on the table and for sale…very pretty on a nice plate of pretty druse as well. She made several smaller trees as prizes for her spin game and several were won on Saturday. Docia puts together some very pretty gem trees, she is a very gifted and talented gemstone craftswoman.

All in all, we both broke even on this show as well, my big sale coming on Friday and hers on Saturday. We both decided to leave about 4 pm Saturday, after sitting out in the heat all day, we had pretty much had it when we packed up and left. They were over around Caledonia while Mom and I were up around Potosi filling the gas tank when a brief rain storm hit and about ten minutes later, it apparently hit the vendor area pretty hard and fast. Docia got a call from Ed and Sandy, friends of ours from Rolla who were also vendors there, and Sandy said the tents were flying thru the air from the wind of the storm. She said we left just in time.

Beautiful Sunset Station Five

Posted on June 12, 2010 by jwj

Thursday evening after I finished running at Station Five on the treadmill, I looked up as I left to see clouds forming what looked like a nice sunset shaping up…so I drove over and picked up my camera and came back in time to capture a very nice sunset with Station 5 as the foreground…another beauty….

Kentucky Fluorite Rock and Gem Show

Posted on June 12, 2010 by jwj

Docia and I drove down to Marion, Kentucky last weekend for the rock and gem show Saturday and Sunday, which was our first show this year and attempt at selling some of our druse quartz and poker chip calcite crystals. I also wanted another chance to get down in the pit of the Eureka Mine and dig for some more beautiful fluorite.

Docia and Floyd arrived early afternoon Friday and got checked into the Relax Inn at Kuttawa so Floyd could get a good nap in…he had driven home from New Orleans all night Thursday night from his workplace there…I called Docia on the way down and told her I would prob arrive about 3 pm and we could go over to the museum and check in with Tina on what was happening for the weekend, and see where we could set up our booth outside…we wanted plenty of good natural light hiitting our druse specimens. I then called Tina to make sure she would be there when we arrived.

Docia and I got to the museum about 3:30 and met with Tina and decided we would set up our booth near the front door of the County Museum where the vendors were going to be set up for the show. We picked a nice shady spot along the sidewalk and then took a quick tour of the museum, so that Docia could see what world class specimens looked like behind glass.

We took off and headed for the steakhouse at Oasis Bar and Grill and had the prime rib, which was the special Friday night. We both like prime rib and were not disappointed at all. It was great !

Next morning we met at the museum and set up our booth at the front of the building, where the sidewalk corners as you walk between the County Museum and the Clement Museum…I had brought along a canopy to set up for shade, but we got lucky and had two excellent shade trees there all day long, one on each side of the sidewalk….so we were fortunate to be in the shade all weekend long.

this is Foh`s Hall, which is now the County Museum, but has also served as a hospital and the school, in the early days of Marion, and then a community center as well. The theatre area was the main hall where vendors set up inside in the air conditioning…we chose natural air conditioning and natural lighting.

this worked well as we caught most folks walking up from the parking lot to the front of the show building or coming from the museum and walking to the show building, and walking back as well most of the time.

there was actually supposed to be another vendor outside with us, but they got cold feet and moved theirs inside, thinking it might rain the first day there. As it was, the weather was quite nice both days, cooler with less humidity on Sunday. Crowds were a little light this year, though, for both the digs and the show. Most of the time when I wanted to shoot this next photo, there were several people at our booths but I couldn`t shoot then…

Saturday night, Docia and I took Floyd out to the steakhouse and we had great steaks once again. Afterwards, I drove over to the lakeside, and shot a beautiful sunset from the Kuttawa City Park, which is located right on the water…was even fortunate to get a nice red and white speedboat zipping across the water against the fluffy pink and white clouds…

and the sky even without the boat was quite nice to shoot above the water….

and as the speedboat drew closer to my position, it scared up some white birds just ahead of it…

after shooting this one, I drove over to the city park and shot this next one with an even deeper color to the sky and water…

absolutely beautifullllll……

Well the next day we arrived at the museum way early…the rest of the vendors decided to sleep in and weren`t going to arrive til 11 am, so I took advantage of the lull and decided to go do some digging. Docia and Floyd decided to stay at the booth just in case and I took off for the Eureka after signing in. Now, I didn`t take my camera into the pit with me, but I can tell you that I filled two bags full of some nice small clusters and a few medium sized ones…also helped a little girl with her merit badge for 4H, she was working on a mineral project, needed to gather eleven minerals and so a few of us there helped her find some nice stuff to take home with her.

I hit a nice pocket above the vein near where I was digging back in April with members of the Memphis Club and after three hours, I drove over to the Hickory Cane Mine tailings to check it out before heading back to the vendor show…

and even more tailings….

Sunbeams and Clouds

Posted on June 10, 2010 by jwj

As I was out rockhunting late in May 2010, the sun disappeared behind some clouds and I looked up to see this nice fluffy cloud backlit…couldnt resist so I snapped it…I like sunbeams as well as sunsets…

Pretty soon I was working on filling the second bag when my rake end snapped off my trusty tool, so I walked one filled bag back to the truck and grabbed my handrake instead…and saw this pretty butterfly on the way back…

As we were leaving and heading home…I looked over at Missy and had to take a pic of her as well…looked like she had been swimming in the clay all day….

Well we started home and started seeing sunbeams all over the place…

On the way home, they were talking on Y98 Radio about a huge thunderstorm parked over the city of St Louis and just dumping alot of rainfall on the entire area….. I spotted it from the Cuba area, about 75 miles to the west of St Louis…

As I drove into Bourbon, I turned off 44 to go by my parents house to show them the nice druse, yes they are druse fans too…and snapped a photo of the Bourbon Water Tower against the supercell clouds…

and saw this sunlit backlit cloud driving down the road near my parents home…

another one of those clouds that looks like its on fire at the top…and this sunset was taken near my home in Sullivan`s city park…I`m like Virgil, like to see Old Glory waving when I include flagpoles in my photos…

Sunbeams…

Posted on May 4, 2010 by jwj

As I drove home from work the morning after the storms, I was able to photograph some sunbeams on the horizon of the sunrise…for some reason, I had a feeling about taking my camera with me to work, so I followed the hunch and was able to shoot a few pics of the sunbeams from the top of the hill on the west side of the rest area…not sure what the other drivers thought I was shooting, but oh well…

I drove on home and found the sunbeams still hanging around, so naturally I took advantage of the situation and shot a few more pics.

this is the east end of town and Oak Grove`s water tower to the left side…and one of my favorite places to shoot, normally full of horses, guess they weren`t awake yet…

and one of our prettiest restored buildings on Main Street, the Bennett Hotel, owned and restored by a good friend of mine…

We had a little sunset right before the storms came into St Louis County the night before, I was able to shoot the clouds rolling in right at sunset…

and…

House/Barn Fire

Posted on April 16, 2010 by jwj

Wow what a weekend…we were busy with accident calls on I-44 at the east end of town due to construction project backup, then were toned out for a vehicle on fire and seconds later, a house fire…as units were pulling up from Hwy WW on the west side of the district, it appeared to them that a barn was on fire, so the first in crew updated dispatch and advised this was a barn on fire…I was out on a shoot and driving in from the west, and was scanning the sky for heavy smoke but saw none, even though the first in crew reported heavy fire conditions and struck a second alarm.

I pulled up on the scene and figured out why, the smoke was staying low and going down the valley, not rising so much. This was an all metal structure with a barn/auto body shop on the northwest end and a house on the south east end of the structure, and heavy fire on both ends, so heavy on the body shop end that crews were unable to enter, and were aiming streams inside through a window and a doorway when I arrived.

As extra crews were arriving from Bourbon Fire District, the fire on the home end vented through a large vent near the peak of the roof, and so an extra line was stretched from Pumper 854 to the other end of the building….

I ran over and helped them stretch the line and as I rounded the far corner, this is what I saw….

and

….so Bourbon`s firefighters suited up and entered the home end of the building to locate the seat of the fire and extinguish it with the extra line, the red colored hoseline…

and as Bourbon`s firefighters entered the house, this is what I saw on the north side of the building…

…smoke rolling out of the north side and inset garage doors, where it was pointed out to us that there were a couple of antique restored cars inside, and if we could open those doors, we could rescue the cars…so we got our saw out and made a new door, since the doors were locked and bolted from the inside and the keys were naturally inside on a peg…

where there`s a way, there`s a will, or something like that…they cut a hole big enough for a firefighter to get in and he unbolted the doors and voila !

and so out the door came one car followed by a nice restored GTO…

Once they freed the two cars, which only had a little smoke damage each, they were able to concentrate efforts on extinguishing the heavy fire up in the upstairs area, which had heavy rolling, deepseated flames. The fire upstairs was so heavy that interior crews were pulled out shortly after…despite the airhorns on the trucks sounding the get out of there now signal, one of the guys, Billy Harris, had to physically walk to the last man on the hoseline and relay the message in person.

So once they were pulled out, they attacked the fire from outside where it was much safer, until it could be knocked down and made safer to enter again…

Once it appeared it was down…firefighters stopped to check and could see it was rolling still, but on the south side….

so they redoubled efforts and resources this time and aimed the streams to the south side…

..utilizing some of St Clair and Cuba`s firefighters to assist us in our efforts…trucks were stacking up out on Hwy WW so the roadway was shut down to normal traffic…

Five fire departments represented in equipment here alone…the fire went to four alarms and nine fire departments responded with sixteen pieces of equipment to help us fight the fire…a massive tanker shuttle was started as well and Hwy WW was utilized for this operation as well…

the alarm was initially received about 4 pm and our firefighters remained on scene til midnight, investigating with the assistance of the Missouri State Fire Marshals Office and extinguishing hot spots. Once the fire on the home end was knocked down, crews were able to enter from the auto body end and extinguish the home end fire…

here Junior Firefighters, Kyle Arnold, is shown watching the doorway and feeding hose to interior firefighters at the auto body end…

Eventually the owner was located and he arrived and conferred with crews on the auto body end about the extent of damage inside…

As I said, what a way to start the weekend….luckily no one was hurt.

Drug House Burns Up….

Posted on March 13, 2010 by jwj

We had a house fire last week, fully involved on arrival and turned out to be a drug house, residents evicted a few days before by the bank who foreclosed on it, so they moved out and someone decided to torch it also. Was at the end of a dead end street for us, hydrant at the top of the hill on the main street, so we hand jacked a five inch supply line to the hydrant from the pumper, inadvertently trapped our police officers in doing so, and attempted to knock down the fire once we established a good water supply. Too bad our new pumper wouldnt cooperate and provide stability as well…never seen a truck so undependable and difficult to operate in all my years on the department…guess computers arent so great in all applications…

this is what greeted us on arrival, closest I could get to the front as there were power lines down across the street to my immediate left. I stayed at this corner until Joe Thurmond arrived to take care of the electric and was able to remove the hazards. Next one is the front corner, where we started our attack.

From here, I walked thru the bushes and photographed our attack crew, Capt Dave Konys and Jimmy Smythe, as they assessed their point of entry and masked up, waiting for water from the pump operator, Capt Gary Midgett. Two junior firefighters were on scene assisting with supply hose and retrieving tools for the guys as they prepared for entry.

Here Capt Dave waits for water and for Jimmy to return with a pike pole, as a column of fire grows from the side door of the residence. Another view with a little help from the flash this time….

and this one without flash at all, silhouetting Dave against the flames somewhat….

Jimmy got back with some tools and decided to mask up as they are still waiting for Gary to send water to them…

and still waiting for water as the fire coming out the doorway increases in size and intensity….

Finally the hoseline is charged and the guys prepare to enter the residence…all during this time we have been hearing muffled explosions inside but on the other side of the home where all you can see if a wall of fire that has extended through the roof of the house…

Finally the line charges and Capt Dave opens the nozzle and knocks down the heavy column of flame as they start to enter the doorway…

Jimmy motions to Gary at the pump, for more water pressure on the line as they enter the doorway, meeting up with tremendous fire and heat as evidenced above the roofline and doorway….

this next photo shows the entire house silhouetted against the flames with Jimmy and Dave inside the doorway fighting fire, and EMT Danny is feeding hose at the doorway as well.

After a few minutes inside, they both back out and Dave goes to get a ceiling hook and pike pole, to see if they can get to more fire via the ceiling above the doorway.

Dave gets back and heads to the front of the house with the pike pole while Jimmy sprays water inside the doorway. EMT Danny keeps an eye on them.

Capt Dave comes back and takes out the window to the right of the doorway, Jimmy is still spraying water inside.

Jimmy is still inside, kneeling down and spraying water now when Dave enters the doorway again, this time armed with a ceiling hook…..

These guys make a great team fighting fire together often.

Dave hooks the ceiling to pull it down so Jimmy can get to more fire above them….

Dave and Jimmy appear to be conferring about the fire above them just inside the doorway….

Dave hooks more ceiling with the hook…

and what they couldnt see from inside the doorway, we were able to see from just outside the doorway…heavy fire rolling across the roof toward them…

Upon seeing this, EMT Danny went up to the door and told them to get out of there…

and so they did, they backed out safely, still fighting fire as they came out the door…

Backed out completely away from the house safe and sound, better safe than sorry guys…

Shortly after backing out, assistance arrived in the form of the second in crew, which was Bourbon Engine 60 with a few guys and Bourbon Chief Daniel Whatley…Daniel had his crew assess the back wall of the house and prepare to attack flames here…

Sullivan firefighter Casey Bridgeman got the chainsaw and made trench cuts on either side of the chimney on the backwall to give greater access to flames inside….

As flames ate through the wood on the back walls, Bourbon firefighters manning the second hoseline attacked the fire from the back yard….

In the meantime, I wandered up and photographed crews around the pumper, including EMT Jesse trying his best to get wet….

He stayed behind Gary and avoided getting wet here…but did move a little hoseline around later on…

wet streets and emergency lights can make for great reflection photos as well as night time fire photos. St Clair and Bourbon firefighters assisted with overhaul and final extinguishment…

These guys did a great job and had things well in hand by this point, so I left shortly afterwards. The fire investigation determined the house was indeed set on fire and Sullivan Police Department apprehended the suspect later this week, suspected of setting another house on fire up near Cuba, Missouri as well. Kudos to the Police Department as well.

Border Collie Rescued Today…

Posted on February 5, 2010 by jwj

I got back in time to see Sullivan firefighters rescue a nice yellow/white border collie dog today, that was stranded on an island out in the Meramac River, just south of Sullivan, near the State Park. He had been out on this island for quite a while from the looks of him and was very hungry and anxious to get out of there, but was definitely hemmed in on all sides by high water. They attempted rescue yesterday but the air boat wouldn`t start so the crews returned today with the spare boat and made a great rescue of him. One of the area residents took him home and will take him to the adoption center in Sullivan tomorrow. Looked like he was dumped by someone.