Fire District 3 purposely let a Double Bluff home burn to the ground last weekend.
With not much room to work in a house-crowded area of the street, dozens of firefighters got practice working a house fire in an urban area. They were also getting used to working with the district’s newest firefighting tool, fire engine that pumps compressed-air foam.
According to Darin Reid, chief of special services for Fire District 3, district firefighters practice on as many as six intentional fires each year. The houses are donated by property owners who want to demolish the structures anyway. The fire district takes away the rubble, saving property owners the majority of the cost of demolition.
“It’s nice all the way around,” Reid said.
On April 29, district firefighters burned a 900-square-foot beach cabin on Shore Avenue near Double Bluff.
Reid said the fire district makes attempts to notify the neighbors of a practice burn, but in this case, neighbors with homes on both sides of the cabin were unreachable and could not be notified.
Fire District 3 began fireproofing the neighboring houses — which were only a few feet away from the house to be burned — at approximately 12:30 p.m. by spraying them with a soapy mixture of biodegradable foam. According to Reid, the foam protects the houses by shielding them from the heat of a fire.
Firefighters then repeatedly ignited and extinguished the house until it burned to the ground.
Reid said the fire district used a variety of strategies to practice fighting fires. Firefighters practiced dousing the fire both the inside and the outside the structure.
The compressed air foam truck was used to fight the flames instead of just water, according to Reid. Reid said the foam mixture, which is lighter than water, is more efficient.
Reid said water typically does more damage to a structure and transports toxins through the air which can be hazardous to the environment.
The foam is also a good water saving device, said Reid. Only about 50 gallons of water mixed with foam are needed to fight a fire that would otherwise need 250 gallons of plain water to extinguish.
Fire District 3 is currently the first and only department in Island County using the foam. The district started using the new foam truck in 2002.
