Today in Fire History 12/29
On 12/29/1963 the Roosevelt Hotel fire in Jacksonville, Florida on Adams Street near Main Street left twenty-two dead, including a firefighter, and sixty-six injured of the 479 transient and 20 permanent guests. Flames, smoke, and toxic gases erupt from the main ballroom around 7:45 a.m. in the 12-story, 300-room hotel, packed with 500 Gator Bowl spectators. Most deaths occurred above the eighth floor. A firefighter died of a heart attack while attempting to rescue trapped guests from the 10th and 11th floors during the fire. “The fire started in the ballroom's ceiling. The old ceiling, which was deemed a fire hazard, was not removed when the new ceiling was installed, providing kindling for the fire, which started from faulty wiring. Some occupants saw that fire department ladders would not reach them; some guests threw mattresses to the ground in an attempt to soften the landing. Guests were warned not to jump. The Mayor called for assistance from the U.S. Navy, and eight helicopters were flown downtown from Cecil Field and NAS Jacksonville. The airmen helped the patrons out of the building and transported them to a nearby parking lot, where ambulances were already waiting. The fire was extinguished by 9:30 a.m., and it was estimated that nearly 475 people were saved from the burning building. After a day of recovering the dead, firefighters found 20 residents dead in their beds from smoke inhalation. A woman died after attempting to climb to safety from her 11th-floor room, but slipped while on the makeshift bedsheet rope she had made.” {The 1963 Gator Bowl was played on schedule with North Carolina (35) beating, Air Force (0)}
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On 12/29/1894 the Cassidy & Sons Manufacturing Company building fire in the East Village of Manhattan, New York, killed two and injured four (FDNY) firefighters in a 5:00 a.m. fire that went to three alarms in the six-story building at 214 and 216 West 24th Street occupied by gas fixtures dealer. “Firefighters were operating on the fifth and sixth floors when without warning the charred beams on the fifth floor gave way, under the weight of a heavy piece of machinery. The two found themselves standing underneath the water tank that was housed on the roof, holding 3,000 gallons of water. The structure weakened from the effect of the fire, collapsed, trapping and killing both men.”
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On 12/29/1926 two Louisville, Kentucky firefighters “died while fighting a fire at the Kentucky Drug Sundries Company. Both men slid from an ice-covered roof and died from head injuries.”
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On 12/29/1927 a Rapids, Iowa firefighter “died while operating at a lumber yard fire.”
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On 12/29/1944 a Boston, Massachusetts firefighter “collapsed and died from the effects of the inhalation of heat, smoke, and gases. The fire at 775 Centre Street (Box 2475) Jamaica Plain.?Box 2475 (Centre & Eliot Streets) went to 3-alarms.”
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On 12/29/1948 a Chicago, Illinois firefighter was fatally injured after he fell from a ladder while fighting a 3-11 fire at 4600 South Paulina Street.
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On 12/29/1977 a Bellville, Ontario, Canada firefighter died after he had helped rescue an occupant from the rear of a house fire on Walbridge Crescent, he put on his self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) and re-entered the structure. While directing the operations inside, he collapsed.
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On 12/29/1981 two Bellow Falls, Vermont firefighters died from smoke inhalation while operating at the Star Hotel fire. “The fire smoldered, causing smoke to become heavy, which reduced visibility. The smoke was so thick that it set off smoke alarms in the Aubuchon Building across the street. The firefighters were searching for any residents that may have been trapped in the building. Fire and town officials at the time said the two firefighters were unable to find their way out of the building when their air tanks ran out.”
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On 12/29/1985 a Waukegan, Illinois firefighter died while fighting a residential fire. Firefighters responded to the fire shortly before 1:00 a.m. and found a large volume of flames inside the two-and-a-half-story building. As two firefighters led an attack line into the house and moved through the first floor, he advanced up to the second story. The building structure was weakened by the fire, and he fell through the floor. Injured, and apparently trapped by flames, he jumped out a first-floor window, where he was found by fellow firefighters. Two other firefighters suffered injuries while fighting this fire, which was started by a faulty furnace that had smoldered for hours.
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On 12/29 2009 a New Holstein, Wisconsin firefighter died while operating at a dumpster fire at a local manufacturing company.?As firefighters applied water to the burning dumpster, an explosion occurred. One firefighter received fatal injuries and eight other firefighters were injured. An investigation concluded that the explosion was caused by the introduction of water and foam into the burning dumpster. The cause of the fire in the dumpster remains unknown.
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On 12/29/2011 an Enderby, British Columbia, Canada firefighter died, and one firefighter was injured, during overhaul at a construction site fire and explosion. Around 4:00 a.m. “firefighters from the Enderby and District Volunteer Fire Department were called out to a construction site at Sperlich Log Construction Inc, a builder of log homes. Shortly after 5:00 a.m., when it appeared the fire was under control, there was an explosion in a shed attached to a main structure on the site.” “There was still fire, but they were just making sure that last little bit was out when that explosion took place.”
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On 12/29/2011 a fire and several explosions engulfed state-owned warehouses and neighboring homes in Myanmar's main city of Yangon that killed six firefighters, and seventeen civilians, and injured 108 in the Southeast Asia country. The fire and blasts destroyed 16 warehouses, a Buddhist monastery, and 76 homes in Mingalar Taung Nyunt township in eastern Yangon.
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On 12/29/2014 a ferry fire that started on the car deck in the Adriatic Sea off Albania, Italy claimed ten lives during an overnight trip from the Greek port of Patras to Ancona in Italy.
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On 12/29/2011 a Northbound Interstate 95 in Volusia County, Florida north of Dunlawton Avenue in Port Orange, motor vehicle crash with an explosion and fire left one dead and injured five when a car carrying three people, U.S. Postal Service tractor-trailer, a logging truck, and a double-semi hauling a dangerous chemical, methyl bromide (an odorless, colorless gas used as a fumigant) crashed about 3:26 a.m.
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On 12/29/2010 an explosion in the William C. Franks Furniture store on South Wayne Road in Wayne, Michigan killed two, thought to have been caused by a gas leak, and forced a mass evacuation of businesses and residences nearby. Consumers Energy received two calls in the area about the smell of gas hours before the explosion; technicians were nearby when the roof of the store collapsed.
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On 12/29/1998, a Birmingham, Alabama abortion clinic was bombed that killed an off-duty police officer and critically injured a nurse. A car observed at the scene was traced to Eric Robert Rudolph, a 31-year-old carpenter; he would also be identified at the Atlanta abortion clinic bombings on January 16, 1997.
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On 12/29/1975 at 6:33 p.m. a bombing occurred at LaGuardia Airport near the TWA baggage reclaim terminal in East Elmhurst, New York City that killed eleven and seriously injured seventy-four. The crime was never solved; however, some investigators believe that Croatian nationalists were responsible. "The force of the bomb ripped a 10-foot by 15-foot hole in the 8-inch reinforced concrete ceiling of the baggage reclaim area. The subsequent fire in the terminal took over an hour to get under control."
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On 12/29/1972 an Eastern Air Lines TriStar carrying 167 passengers crashed into the Everglades, 93 survive; the wide-bodied Lockheed L1011 en route from New York to Miami crashed just before midnight, 17 miles northwest of Miami International Airport.
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On 12/29/1966 the Hotel Marcy in Lake Placid, New York fire killed five employees in the 70-year-old three-story building with a wing attached to the six-story main structure. The wing contained a kitchen, dining room, swimming pool, sauna baths, employees' quarters, and a few guest units. All 475 guests of the hotel, for the holiday week, escaped unharmed.?The fire started around 3:15 a.m. with the temperature reaching an overnight low of -11 degrees F.
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On 12/29/1907 dust in the Stuart Mine, near Fayetteville, outside of Charleston, West Virginia exploded killing eighty or more men who were working more than 500 feet below the surface.
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On 12/29/1895 seven blocks, forty-six residences, and businesses of St. Augustine, Florida were destroyed by accidental fire leaving 40 families homeless in the oldest city in the United States.
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On 12/29/1894 a fire destroyed several buildings on West Main Street in Louisville, Kentucky that started in the four-story building occupied by Stuckey, Brent, & Co.
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On 12/29/1887 a fire broke out in Williston, in Barnwell County, South Carolina, and spread rapidly to neighboring buildings despite the exertions of citizens.
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On 12/29/1778 the British captured Savannah, Georgia during the Revolutionary War.
On 12/29/1777 Part of the Continental Army abandon their siege on Fort Independence, in Bronx County, New York when a surprise British counterassault occurred in the bitter cold and with a snowstorm approaching.
On 12/29/1808 Andrew Johnson the 17th President was born in Raleigh, North Carolina.
On 12/29/1845 Texas entered the Union.
On 12/29/1862 the Civil War Battle of Chickasaw Bluffs starts.
On 12/29/1890 U.S. Army massacred Indians at Wounded Knee.
On 12/29/1940 London was "Blitzed" by German aircraft using incendiary bombs setting both banks of the Thames ablaze and killing almost 3,600 British civilians.