According to the Chicago Fire Department's Twitter account,
"Still & Box in a highrise & EMS Plan 1 @ 4650 N Sheridan, a dumpster on fire per BC 9, two civilians injured. All company's working."
4650 Sheridan is the location of the former Fresh Harvest Market, definitely not a highrise. We think it's more likely that the site of the fire was 4640 N Sheridan, Eastwood Towers.
We hope that the two people who incurred injuries are not seriously hurt and can recover quickly.
Readers also report that emergency equipment was also called to the same location on Sunday night as well. Anyone know anything about that? Two nights in a row sounds vaguely worrisome.
Please leave any further information in the comments.
At the height of the response, there were 10 firetrucks (not including other fire response support vehicles: ex fire chief, etc), 2 ambulances and a number of police cars, including one blocking northbound access to Sheridan at Wilson. I've really never seen a fire response like this anywhere before. The response indeed was for Eastwood Towers as firemen were going to and from trucks to the front door of that high rise. While I'm unsure what initiated such a huge response, it must have been a rather small event - a number of firemen *walked* from their trucks to the front door at ET, axes in hand, O2 tanks, defibrillators, etc, only to nonchalantly walk back a minute or two later. I watched from my condo across the street for about 10 minutes, decided to take a shower, and by the time I was out, the road was clear again with no indication of anything having happened, whatsoever.
ReplyDeleteAgain, wonderful to see these resources and response was available, but was curious what was called in as I've never seen any response like that anywhere before! (I do know if there was a full on high rise fire, this would be mandated, but there was no indication of severity of this magnitude from what I could see)
They are there again this morning.
ReplyDeleteThis is the third or fourth response like this I've noticed in the past few weeks at the same location. This appears to be the largest emergency response though.
ReplyDeleteIs there a pyro in the area? Faulty wiring? Someone pulling the alarm? Who knows… I noticed there’s a lot of nice elderly in this building along with some drug dealers. I’ve actually seen the drug deals happen this past summer in front of the building. I wonder if this building is on the Alderman’s watch list as it appears to be getting worse.
According to Wikipedia,
ReplyDeleteThe Still & Box Alarm is usually an upgrade of a "Still" or "High-Rise Still Alarm", and includes the R.I.T. (Rapid Intervention Team) Response. If the fire is reported to have persons trapped or the Fire Alarm Office receives numerous calls for the same location, then a "Still & Box Alarm" is automatically transmitted by Fire Alarm Office.
Still & Box Alarm:
4 Engines
2 Trucks (1 is RIT)
1 Tower Ladder
1 Squad
3 Battalion Chiefs (1 is Plan, 1 is RIT & 1 is Box)
1 Deputy District Chief (2-2-x)
1 Command Van (2-7-x)
1 Ambulance (Either ALS: 1 to 60 or BLS: 80 to 94)
1 OFI Unit (4-6-x)
1 EMS Field Chief (4-5-x)