WORCESTER — District Chief Geoffrey Gardell gets a little laugh when the Fire Department’s morning roll call is broadcast. His name is announced, then his brother’s — Capt. Timothy Gardell, who is an acting district chief. “I giggle every time I hear it,” Geoffrey said recently, standing outside the Franklin Street Fire Station. For the Gardell brothers, their lives are a ...

PHILADELPHIA - Capt. Troy K. Gore, an officer detailed to the Philadelphia Fire Department's recruitment team, was placed on paid leave yesterday over allegations that he proposed a scheme to bring in more minority candidates by doctoring the city's computerized application process. Fire Commissioner Lloyd Ayers announced the move and said he was opening an investigation into an e-mail sent last ...

SAN ANTONIO — Authorities say a man believed to have been missing after a fuel-laden 18-wheeler exploded at a Texas refinery has been found safe. San Antonio Fire Chief Charles Hood says the man is a driver of one of three tanker trucks that were at an AGE Refining Inc. fueling station when the Wednesday explosion happened. Hood says another driver ...

STOLLINGS, W.Va. — The second fire in a year will delay the reopening of a southern West Virginia coal processing plant, owner Massey Energy Co. said Wednesday. The fire that damaged the new Zigmond Processing plant Tuesday and one that destroyed its predecessor Aug. 27 started with cutting and welding on steel pipe, Mine Safety and Health Administration spokeswoman Amy Louviere ...

MIAMI - Call it the miracle on Miami's North Bayshore Drive. Authorities and witnesses say that a palm tree likely saved the life of Joey Williams, a 4-year-old boy who fell Friday morning from a 17th-floor balcony after chasing a balloon through his apartment home at the Doubletree Grand Hotel Biscayne Bay. The boy opened a sliding glass door, climbed over ...

WASHINGTON, DC - Sometimes history seems to repeat itself at the Supreme Court, and apparently settled issues reemerge in slightly different forms. And so there will be a feeling of deja vu at the court Monday morning when the justices turn their attention to an especially familiar-sounding issue: whether minority firefighter applicants in Chicago waited too long to sue when the ...

ALPINE, Texas — A patient and his wife were among the dead when an air ambulance crashed shortly after takeoff from a West Texas airport, killing all 5 people on board. The crash happened about 12:15 a.m. Sunday about a mile east of Alpine-Casparis Municipal Airport, around 200 miles southeast of El Paso. The twin-engine Cessna 421 had just taken off ...

At fire scenes, police and neighbors typically wait for firefighters, the ones with the protective gear. But that doesn't work when somebody says a toddler is trapped upstairs in a burning townhouse, which happened early Friday morning in Grandview. At that point, they went. No one was able to save the child. But they tried. First up was the neighbor, Steve ...

BOSTON - The roiling debate over the controversial arbitration award for Boston firefighters came to a head today at City Hall, where an army of firefighters held a defiant, spirited rally before standing watch over marathon hearings in the City Council that inflamed passions. The proceedings, stretching into the evening, swung from tedious discussion about city finances to loud, contentious arguments ...

BOCA RATON, FL — They brought out pulleys, hoists, straps and boards. The group of Boca Raton firefighters pretended to rescue injured workers stuck in underground pipes. "You're going to take the guy and strap him on here," said private instructor Kevin Mullen as he demonstrated on a plastic board. Tuesday was the second day of training for 17 Boca Raton ...

PORTSMOUTH, VA - The Portsmouth Fire Department set out to raise money for one of their own who is fighting cancer while raising three small children by selling $5 fire helmet decals and $10 vehicle decals. The effort is helping Sarah and Matthew Fox pay their bills while Sarah, a 38-year-old paramedic and firefighter, battles cancer, which has spread from her ...

WOODSBORO, Md. --The Frederick County Fire Marshal's Office determined the spontaneous combustion of tightly compacted hay bales caused a barn fire Sunday in the 10200 block of Oak Hill Road. Marc McNeal, chief fire marshal at the Frederick County Division of Fire and Rescue Services, said a worker in the 75- by 400-foot barn was moving some hay bales when a ...

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 ...

ST. CLOUD, FL - An Osceola County firefighter was hurt today at a demonstration for children at a summer camp. The man, whose name was not released, was putting equipment into a ladder truck when he came into contact with part of the apparatus as another firefighter raised the ladder, said Danny McAvoy, Osceola County deputy fire chief. The aluminum ladder ...

UPDATED CHARLES CITY (AP) — Authorities in Floyd County say the Assistant Charles City Fire Chief needed the help of his department after a trench collapse trapped him up to his armpits in soil. The Charles City Fire Department was called to Assistant Chief David Boehmer's home Monday afternoon. Firefighters say Boehmer was working on a new home on his property ...

Top Hub fire brass could reap tens of thousands of dollars over the next decade for taking random drug and alcohol tests, padding their pay and straining city coffers for years to come, a City Hall watchdog warned. “It’s a runaway cost, and every year it will get to be more and more,” said Matthew Cahill, executive director of the Boston ...

SPRINGFIELD - A 26-year-old Springfield man was arrested late Tuesday in connection with a fire that led to the deaths of three children. Shortly before 11 p.m. Greene County Jail officials confirmed a man was booked on a 24-hour hold pending the filing of formal charges. He was arrested by Springfield police officers on suspicion of first-degree arson, according to online ...

SAN JOSE - Firefighters who arrived at a burning house in San Jose on Wednesday saw a horrifying sight — a man standing in the entryway with his clothes on fire. Two firefighters pulled the man from the house on Tampa Way, rolled him on the grass and began administering medical treatment, according to fire Capt. Chuck Rangel. He was transported ...

TULSA, OK – Now that Tulsa's laid-off police officers may be coming back, some are wondering about the sacrifices Tulsa firefighters made to keep the city's budget balanced. Tulsa police lost officers, while the fire department lost pay. City leaders say it doesn't have to be a competition between Tulsa's finest and Tulsa's bravest. If the police department gets more money ...