Calling for an outside review of the Northville Township Fire Department

Calling for an outside review of the Northville Township Fire Department It is 1:12 AM and I am mad as hell. At approximately 12:14 AM a house 5 houses away from us caught on fire. I had been asleep with the windows open when I heard some loud hollering. I went to a side window to investigate and saw a rather ominous orange glow and noticed a strong odor of burning wood. I immediately realized that something major was burning. I quickly got dressed and grabbed a flashlight to see if there was anything that I could do. By the time I got to the scene, I found an attached garage totally engulfed in flames and fire beginning to eat at the attached two story house. I asked the neighbors if they knew if everyone had exited the house and they assured me that they had. It took perhaps another 5 minutes for any local responders to show up. A couple of police cars arrived as we watched our neighbor’s house burn. Finally the first fire truck showed up. I estimate that it took between 15 and 20 minutes for the first fire truck to show up. We had located the nearest fire hydrant and I stood by it with my flashlight trained on it to assist the fire department. After that I felt like I was watching a keystone cop’s movie in slow motion. One fire fighter showed up with a woefully short wrench to turn the water on and could not budge the valve. I tried to help him push the wrench but we were unable to budge that frozen valve. One of our very mechanically inclined neighbors, Paul, heroically ran back and forth between this hydrant and his garage with different tools to try to help unfreeze this stuck valve. After struggling with this valve unsuccessfully for at least 5 minutes, the fire department gave up and began a search for the next nearest hydrant. After what seemed like a long time they finally located one farther east on Ladywood Drive. I found my way down to the distant hydrant to see if I could help, even if all I did was hold my flashlight on the valve while he was turning. Fortunately this one was operable and the valve was able to be turned on. The fireman at the hydrant radioed down the street to see if they were ready to receive the water (I think it had to go through a pumper truck). Turns out after all this time they were not ready to receive. After a few more agonizingly long minutes they finally turned on the only operable hydrant. I talked to the neighbor that lives in the house where the bad fire hydrant was and he tells me that in the 5 or 6 years that he has lived there he has never observed the hydrant being flushed. He also had never seen a tag that indicated the last time that it had been inspected. In comparing notes with neighbors that have lived in our neighboring communities, I am told that the other communities flush out every hydrant at least once a year and attach tags showing when the hydrant was last inspected. How many more fire hydrants in Northville Township are inoperable???!!! I estimate that it was 30 minutes from the time the fire started until water from a functioning fire hydrant actually reached the fire. It is now 1:56 as I type this report. I have just returned from the fire scene a second time. About 25 minutes ago, while typing this report I heard a loud series of shouts from the crowd five houses down. One of the SUV sized fire support vehicles just ran into the house across the street from the house that is now partially burned down. There was no one inside the vehicle when this mishap occurred. UNBELIEVEABLE!!! Between the long response time, the inoperative fire hydrant, the lack of coordination between the fire fighters and “allowing” one of their vehicles to run into a neighboring house narrowly missing the people standing outside, I guess I have to say that I am ashamed of our fire department. I am publically calling for an outside investigation into the fire hydrant inspection process, the local training of our fire fighters and the general readiness of the Northville Township Fire Department. Tonight’s performance was unacceptable! Bob Cushman