MONTECITO, Calif.—The California Highway Patrol is investigating why a firefighter was handcuffed for refusing to move a fire engine from a freeway in Santa Barbara County. CHP Capt. Jeff Sgobba says the incident on Feb. 15 was rare, regrettable and embarrassing. The confrontation took place in Montecito when CHP officers responded to a freeway crash that caused minor injuries. Sgobba says ...

SAN CARLOS, CA - Four of five San Carlos City Council members said this week they are open to dropping the pay of new firefighters by as much as 10 percent to increase the city's savings when it forms a new fire department in October. If the council decides at its Monday meeting to pay new firefighters that much less than ...

ROCKFORD, Ill. (AP) — A veteran Rockford firefighter accused of stealing more than $15,000 from the department by falsifying time sheets has resigned. Rockford fire lieutenant Brian Watkins stepped down Saturday during a hearing to decide whether he would keep his job. He'd been with the department for nearly 20 years. [widget:flywheel_links] Watkins told supporters at the Rockford Board of Fire ...

KANSAS CITY - In a house filled with smoke, Shawnee firefighter John Glaser became sick in his breathing mask, removed it and died, investigators reported. The report from Kansas fire investigators said Glaser, 33, rescued a dog before going back in to look for the homeowner, who was not there. According to the report released Thursday by Shawnee: Glaser, his partner ...

ANTIOCH, IL - An Antioch firefighter died early Saturday when a pickup truck he was driving crashed into a utility pole in far north Lake County, authorities said. Eric Norden, 30, of Wilmot, Wis., died from multiple trauma, said Lake County Coroner Richard Keller. He said Norden was pronounced dead at the scene at 5:45 a.m. Keller said Norden was driving ...

DODGE COUNTY, GA - While trying to clean up debris after severe weather tore through Dodge County, an area firefighter died from an acute heart attack. The firefighter, 42-year-old Jay C. Brown, was called out to cut down and remove trees that fell during recent storms on Friendship UMC road. At around 6:45pm Brown began feeling short of breath. He was ...

POLK COUNTY, FL - A 58-year-old man is in critical condition this morning at Orlando Regional Medical Center after his son doused him with gas in Polk County and set him on fire, officials say. Ronald W. Harris, Jr., 37, is accused of dousing his father with gasoline on Sunday and using a lighter to ignite the gas, the Polk County ...

SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) - A parked Spokane Fire Department engine with nobody at the wheel rolled into a home where firefighters were making an aid call. Fire Chief Bobby Williams says the truck had been parked about 100 yards from the home Wednesday night. Shortly after medics walked inside, they heard the crash. KXLY-TV reports the engine knocked down porch supports ...

BOSTON - Federal prosecutors trying an ex-Boston firefighter on fraud charges this week plan to graphically chart what they say was the jake’s robust, healthy lifestyle of playing baseball and competing in bodybuilding contests while he was being paid to sit home with a bad back. Albert Arroyo, 49, of Roslindale is accused of applying for tax-free accidental-disability retirement benefits for ...

ROCKVILLE, Md. - Two Metro workers are dead after an early morning accident near the Rockville Metrorail station. Metro says there will be no Red Line train service between the Shady Grove and Rockville Metrorail stations Tuesday morning. Trains are operating between the Glenmont and Twinbrook. Metro is encouraging riders to use the Twinbrook and Grosvenor-Strathmore Metrorail stations. Riders should expect ...

LOS ANGELES—A new report says poor communications and unexpected fire conditions caused the deaths of two firefighters whose truck plunged off a mountain road last year during a massive Los Angeles County wildfire. Capt. Tedmund Hall and Arnaldo Quinones died on Aug. 30 during the 250-square-mile Station fire in the foothills above Los Angeles. A county Fire Department report issued this ...

SOMERSET, PA - A Somerset County fire department is mourning the loss of a firefighter who was rushed to the hospital Saturday afternoon from training. Scalp Level & Paint Volunteer Fire Co. President Dennis Berkey said John Palomino was taken to Miners Medical Center in Hastings where he died. “He was a really good member,” Berkey said. Berkey said Palomino, who ...

ASHLEY, Ind. - It was discovered that the volunteer firefighter driving the Ashley fire tanker that flipped over onto its top last Friday, is partly to blame for the accident. The accident happened during a fire run. The tanker flipped over onto its right side and then onto its back as it turned left onto North Grand Avenue. The crew was ...

SEATTLE - With the first floor of her home in flames, Helen Gebregiorgis rushed upstairs to alert her sister and five young children as the smoke alarm blared. Gebregiorgis grabbed her 5-year-old niece, Samarah Smith, and dashed downstairs, believing the others were behind her. They weren't. Driven back by the heat and flames, her sons Joseph Gebregiorgis, 13, and Yaseen Shamam, ...

FORT LEE, N.J. — Two people who'd moved into a northern New Jersey town house a day earlier have died in a fire that started in their kitchen and spread upstairs. Police say 52-year-old Eliot C. Nisenbaum and 55-year-old Ronald Sandberg were found Saturday night in the second-floor master bedroom of their home in Fort Lee, overlooking the Hudson River. Firefighters ...

HARTFORD — - The fire lieutenant who led the initial attack on the ferocious blaze that consumed William Beckerman's 3,200-square-foot West Hartford home last February was the first witness called Wednesday in Beckerman's trial on charges that he set the fire. Lt. Chris Gordon, who retired from the West Hartford Fire Department in July, described being confronted with blinding smoke as ...

NEW YORK — A woman who lost seven children and her husband in a 1978 arson at their home near Albany was questioned again this week as investigators put renewed effort into solving the case. No one was ever charged for setting the fire 32 years ago in Cohoes. Detectives traveled to Okanogan, Wash., and spent several hours Wednesday questioning Virginia ...

FARMINGTON, MO — Six volunteer firefighters survived a rollover accident in the Farmington Fire Department's pumper tanker truck, one that the Missouri State Highway Patrol says was caused by another motorist. Investigators say the driver of the tanker were trying to avoid a motorist during a routine fire call. The Farmington volunteer crew had their lights and sirens blaring heading down ...

ASHLAND, Ore. — Families looked for valuables, pets and mementoes Wednesday in the ashes of 11 homes destroyed by a fast-moving wildfire while a homeless man accused of starting the blaze sat in jail. John Thiry, 40, was arrested at 3 a.m. under a freeway ramp and charged with 11 counts of reckless endangerment and 11 counts of reckless burning, authorities ...

CHICAGO - Mayor Daley’s appointment of third-generation firefighter Robert Hoff to replace ousted Fire Commissioner John Brooks sailed through a City Council committee on Monday — with a promise from Hoff to embrace older black applicants bypassed by the city’s discriminatory handling of a 1995 firefighters exam. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last month that African-American applicants did not wait too ...