Sterling house explosion: LATEST UPDATES

good afternoon everybody I think it's good afternoon no still good morning sorry um did our Pio give you our contact information name so far does she introduce everybody I Haven and Ju Just A clarification of my title is system Chief as far as Chief but system Chief means in charge of the entire um combined fire and rescue system for Laden County which includes the volunteers uh Chief panon the assistant chief of the Sterling Volunteer Fire Company obviously chair Randall chair of the Board of Supervisors and many of you met assistant chief Williams who was here last night um assistant chief of operations for fire and rescue so I'll read a um a couple points here uh updates from uh what we've learned since last night and then we'll be available to answer some questions for you um at this point so at approximately 193 our Len County Communication Center our 911 Center received a call for an outside gas leak an order of gas in the area units with dispatched for that investigation arrived on the scene at 1948 hours in the 300 block of Silver Ridge Drive in Sterling after arriving on the scene our crew found a 500-gon undergr underground propane tank leaking the O the propane from that leak had migrated into the homes when firefighters arrived in the home they meeted the home they assessed the situation and entered the home uh with the appropriate PPE at that point um at 20 25 hours units on the scene reported a catastrophic explosion that caused multiple Mayday of our firefighters down inside the structure and injured firefighters outside the structure luckily the two occupants of the home were removed by by firefighters upon our arrival as well as some of the pets and we can credit our firefighters for the removal of those citizens efforts to locate the res and rescue the trapped members firefighters immediately commenced and at 2028 a rapid intervention task force and a second alarm was requested to the scene at 2036 hours a second Mayday occurred a second firefighter trapped under debris in trouble at 21 15 hours the incident command reported that all units were accounted for and receiving medical care that was somewhat chaotic as we tried to figure out how many firefighters were trapped under the debris in what you see at the scene it is a heavy heart that we announced that one fir firefighter from the Sterling Volunteer Fire Company was determined to be deceased on the scene there was a total of 10 firefighters transported to local hospitals to include the Washington burn Center in Washington DC there are two career firefighters and seven Sterling Volunteer Fire Company Personnel injured and again the one uh deceased and one firefighter from Fairfax County received injuries and was transported next ofkin notifications have been commenced and completed we did have been in contact with the family of the deceased firefighter and off assistance to that family as well as the count assistant at this point there were two occupants at a house as I mentioned and both of them were able to escape with minor injuries and have been released staff Personnel have been assigned from fire and rescue to the hospitals to assist all those that remain in the hospital and were assisting uh the Fire Marshal's Office L County Fire Marshal's Office remains on the scene and they'll be there for an extended period of time doing an origin and cause investigation to determine the cause of this fire at this time I do not have any uh complete cause of the fire we can assume it was propane related but no complete cause has been initiated we will provide additional updates as they become available as far as the deceased the deceased name is Trevor Brown of the Sterling Volunteer Fire Company he's 45 years old survived by a wife and three children the family ask that you please respect their privacy in this time of difficult times last night Firefighter Brown was transported to the medical examiner with full honors with full escort and that's will he be until autopsy is completed and then ultimately a cause of death is determined at some point later on our fire and rescue staff will continue to work on four pillars uh throughout the coming Day first and foremost is to take care of our family our fire department family our system members welfare is our highest priority those that are in the hospital and those that have also received trauma on the scene of this emergency we have an extensive Behavioral Health and peer support team in in progress at this point and we offer our full um peer support to our members as mentioned we are completing the origin and cause investigation which will take seven day several days by our fire marshal staff we also have a significant incident investigation team formed which will look at all aspects of this incident what we did right what we could have done better and that will be joined by members of outside Len County Fire and Rescue to get an objective look at our investig ation and finally we have a funeral to plan and that work is already ongoing now to work with the family to honor their wishes so we can honor the loved one of firefighter Trevor Brown and that will is also ongoing we are meeting with the family today as of this time besides Trevor Brown who is deceased four members of our system remain in the hospital in varing levels of um uh injury um we expect them all to um survive and uh receiving Care at at least three of the hospitals in our area to include Washington MedStar Hospital Burn Center in DC at this time uh I and my staff and folks with me are available for questions I can imagine it is um as far Chief it's the worst thing we could possibly do right it's a thing we train for not to do um in a sense we lost one we lost a family member we lost one of our own as a system doesn't matter it's career a volunteer we lost the family member and quite frankly it's like losing one of our own in another sense it's proud that quite frankly I we're probably lucky we only have one fatality um 14 firefighter 14 people injured our folks were in that house when it exploded and that's a miracle um that I just spoke with the uh the homeowner with a minor injury and we saved her um so our folks did their job they showed up and they did what they had to do um we prepare for this we have a full plan for dealing with line of duty deaths we hope we never have to use it but we're using it today hey what do you want people to know who may have the same sort of gas system as this house who may be the things that some of the neighbors told us they were smelling throughout the afternoon and and evening before a 911 call was actually placed so that way something like this doesn't first and foremost if they smell any type of gas whether it's natural gas or propane to call 9911 that that is the did the right thing she called 911 she's alive today because she did um so this was a propane tank isolated to this home so we have no expect expectation that this is a widespread problem or incident it is isolated to this particular home uh we part of our investigation will find out why this gas seeped out of the tank and why it it went into the home and why quite frankly it exploded the home so that's part of the investigation that's ongoing just to follow up if I may can you just go through that timel one one more time firefighters get there how long after the firefighters are on the scene does the house explode so our units arrived on the scene um with a pro paint tank I'm just looking at my notes Here we arrived at 1948 hours um just within 10 minutes we arrived on the scene again for an investigation um the the explosion happened at 20 25 hours so again we we got on the scene at 1948 going through that investigation they probably started outside because that was a report of the leak looking outside entering the home um and then at some point 2025 we don't know what caused the explosion um but certainly any ignition Source will cause an explosion if there's a level of gas and then can you just speak to what it's like as a chief I know it's part of the job sometimes it's what you sign up for but having to having to plan a funeral for a fellow member of the fire rescue Community what it's like devastating myself uh the County Administrator um spoke with the the wife this morning um uh we deliver we delivered the news to her that her loved one died about 1:00 a.m. this morning um there's three children in the house um and we spoke to her this morning very strong woman I will say and we offered our full support we will not leave her side until she asked us to leave her side we have family Liaisons that'll be assigned to the family so that's our Focus now is um her the the wife and family but our whole entire family we have over 2,000 career and volunteer members of our system and we have to support every one of them right now so um he was a member for six years I'll offer Chief panan uh again with such a large system um I personally did not know Trevor Brown um about six years in our system I know he did leave move away for a little while or did but he's back volunteering in the stoling volunteer fire coming anything to as soon as he moved back into the area he came back and rejoined no as soon as he got back in the area he came back and rejoined the fire department you know he had to leave because of a job and then came back to this area but been a you know a very dedicated member and uh you know riding up there for like I said over six years now you know I think most of us I started I Know Chief Williams we most of us started as Volunteers in our careers I'm a fourth generation volunteer it makes no difference whether you do this for pay or whether you do this for volunteers the hazards are the same to all of us were house yeah and that just to be clear that propane tank is off to the side of the house it's not in the basement for that tank one we have to check for occupants we make sure that everybody's out of the house um and then we have to control the leak that's our job to try and control the leaking propane right if we have 500 gallons we don't wait till all 500 gallons is leaked out of the tank we have to try and control that we did request a hazardous materials response and our ha hazardous materials Response Team deals with these type of leaks all the time um and that's their job and so we were trying to mitigate the emergency and make it safe for the surrounding neighbors and and the homeowner I do not have any information on that what role is Washington Gas playing in in this investigation I don't believe any um the propane is not as far as I know is not supplied by Washington Gas I don't know uh we're still in the investigative mode I cannot release the company's name that's supplied the propane that'll be part of the investigation of course can you to they need to know what other houses haveed sure um so the Fire Marshals uh deal with uh structure and the safety of structures as well we do inspections um so our staff has is evaluating that house um there is significant damage to that house and if it's deemed uninhabitable they will post that structure and not allow people inside of it until you know a contractor can come out in repair or do whatever they need to do the only one there are damage to other homes but that one to the to the right as you see the scene is very significant I just have one more thing I mean we've been out here since a lot of us since very early this morning and we've seen dozens if not hundreds of people kind of file in and just see what happened in their community over the past couple of hours um if there's something that you could say to them is you know when they're looking at all this damage things to look out for so that way again this doesn't repeat itself those folks uh one thank you for the support and I'll get to that in a minute but again reiterate if there's ever emergency smell of gas propane natural gas whatever it may be you call 911 that's our job to respond and take care of these emergencies and again I I credit our folks with saving two Liv last night unfortunately one firefighter lost their life it's not what we ever look forward to but we all go into this job and volunteer a career knowing that that could happen I we'll speak to the level of support I am joined today by obviously our chair the Board of Supervisors and I uh supervisor glass supervisor um um brisman and uh Saints was here last night supervisor Saints our entire Board of Supervisors our County administrators standing off to the right here at Tim hem Street we receive tremendous support I've had local politicians reach out I have probably had some kind of text or email from every single fire chief and seems like in the Comm MTH of Virginia offering their support we are a family we are a system and whether it's here here in lden County Statewide nationally um we come together in times of need unfortunately or fortunately and uh it's comforting to know that we have this support so our work is kind of done operationally but we have lots of work to do uh to do a lot of things to take care of the family and the system members one more question is ital for a home that's pretty normal to have that size tank supplying a home again some homes are supplied Heat by gas um natural gas which washing gas or home you know piping on the ground some propane some's electric so all of us have various levels of heating and and fuel in our home some more fuel oil right we don't see as much fuel oil um but there's many different ways to heat your home and propane is one of them to set up anys yeah um chair Randall just reminded me we're working with the family right now um there's a lot of benefit that come and I say benefits in the sense of assistance to the families we're coordinating all that from the county standpoint and from uh a lot of entities we're working on that so if there's any kind of uh information as far as funds or anything like that we'll work with our Pio office public information office to get that to everybody we want to do this right uh sometimes we have to be careful and and do it it's right and do it safely for the family and not intrude on their privacy if no other questions thank you so much for being here and your patience thank you thank you thank you

Channel: FOX 5 Washington DC

Views: 28,815

Keywords: news, explosion, sterling home explosion, sterling, northern virginia, firefighter, volunteer firefighter

Id: rEkuHgtEaTA

Length: 15min 30sec (930 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 17 2024