Don't pay $75 Fee and your House catches Fire..Tough Luck!!!

Its not like they didnt show up at all and refused to come out (which may have been better)...they watched the home burn to the ground.

They came out because the next door neighbor, who paid his fee, was afraid his house would also catch.

If they cover the area for a fee then they cover the area.

The area is limited to the house that pays the fee. Not the one next door. Just like your home owners insurance.

As a line firefighter, you dont worry about money while the flames are raging...you let the attorneys cover that.

You would if the insurance doesn’t cover you because you are out of your area with no mutual aid agreement. We all know how insurance companies like to reject claims. I would expect there to questions relating to the number of runs per year when determining the insurance rates. The more runs the higher the insurance rates will be. If a fire fighter were to become disabled or perish you can bet they will do what ever then can to mitigate the claim.

When it comes to an attorney: What is he going to get from a trailer sitting on a rented space?

I'm actually wondering if there was a further decision not to start an interior attack to get the fire out.

You guys have got to realize that this is a volunteer fire department with no full-time paid members. So these guys may have been coming from their place of employment which could be miles from the station. By the time that the first piece of apparatus arrived on the scene, the house could have been too far gone to have been worth saving anyway. I believe that the line officer in command on the scene may have actually made the decision on scene based on that possibility. I wouldn't want to send guys into a burning house that wouldn't have been salvageable. It's not worth risking serious injury or even the death of a fireman by sending them in to fight a fire like that.

From what I have read elsewhere he called the FD and agreed to pay the fee then. So I would expect one of the first questions from the FD would have been “Is everyone out?”.

I know that our local FD fights fires from the outside unless they suspect someone is trapped inside (pets don’t count). If there are no cars in the driveway and the neighbors don’t indicate that someone should be inside they won’t enter. Why risk the life of fire men on an outside chance.

Aren’t all trailer fires considered a total loss?

The firemen who responded and sat and watched a home burn to the ground are lacking in morals and overall human compassion.

No they are following the orders of their boss. They could be terminated if they took it upon themselves to use and risk city equipment on a fire they were told specifically not to fight. Plus you would put the city in legal jeopardy if you fight this freebie but not that freebie. You let my antique car collection burn but you saved his trailer? You are talking millions of dollars in law suits once you start to pick and chose which freebies to fight. Or a city resident vs a freebie county. It comes down to money and law suits.

reply to post by samkent


You can say they are following orders that does not make it any better.

I fully understand fighting the fire from the outside; however, they did not even do that.

I have medical and hazmat first responder training. I work with people who are volunteer firemen. Speaking with them even they do not agree with what these people did. Again it would have been little out of pocket had they each tossed some in to pay their tax bill and then they could even bill them later with a fine. Even if each fireman lost $10 out of pocket it would have been a better moral choice than to let the house burn.

The Nazis said they were simply following orders too. In fact many throughout history have claimed to have been following orders, it does not make the choice any higher on the moral scale.

I stand by the statement that those who watched and did nothing and had a means to at least help have no morals and no human compassion. They are nothing more than shells for a money grubbing government. Someday that same government will feed on them and others will watch as they lose something that means something to them.

Raist

if everyone got to snub every tax, with the opportunity to pay it back in full when you did need it nothing would get done.

The cost of fighting the fire would have been more then the $75 times X amount of years.

Originally posted by samkent
Aren’t all trailer fires considered a total loss?

Almost all mobile home fires are a total loss no matter how much of it was saved. The average mobile home can go up in flames in about seven and a half minutes. On fires like that, the secne commander will not let firemen enter unless someone is reported to be trapped. We found that out the hard way last year when we had two firefighters die fighting a mobile home fire after someone said there was somebody trapped inside.