As seen around … Cedar Rapids, IA

This from Isaac Main:

Hi,

I am a Chicago-area native and fan of your blog and I witnessed a fire in an office building this evening where I live in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. I don’t know if the readers of your blog would be interested in seeing these images and I don’t have any details about the fire because the scene is still active and I nothing has been reported in the news yet. I’ve attached a couple of images. I have more if you’re interested.

I don’t know any details about how many alarms (the Cedar Rapids Fire Department described it as a “major fire” on their Twitter), but there were 5 engines, two trucks (from two different cities), two ambulances, a heavy rescue, two battalion chiefs pickups, and another staff car of some sort. I heard several explosions and ran to the scene from my apartment, about a block away. There were flames through the roof when I arrived and the first engine showed up just before me. I think everyone in the building escaped unscathed. The building was occupied by a hospital and I think it was just offices, but I’m not sure given the explosions.

Thanks for your time,

Isaac

Isaac Main photo

Isaac Main photo

This entry was posted on April 7, 2021, 8:00 PM and is filed under Apparatus on-scene, Fire Scene photos. You can follow any responses to this entry through RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

#1 by Bill Post on April 8, 2021 - 12:05 PM

Isaac I could see the fire really took hold of the second floor and was going through the roof. Was only the second truck a mutual aid company and where was it from? Were the five engines on the scene all from Cedar Rapids and was Quint 7 there?

By the amount of apparatus that responded, it was more or less equivalent to a Still and Box Alarm in Chicago though I know most places don’t have the same alarm designations as Chicago. Many places use a code alarm classification system. Are you familiar with the alarms and response system in Cedar Rapids? Do you have a scanner to listen to Cedar Rapids fire communications? That would really help.

Did both trucks use their aerials and were they tower ladders?

I don’t know what kind of alarm classification system Cedar Rapids uses. In our area many departments use a system with a Code 3 designation for a reported structure fire and a Code 4 if it’s a working fire. After that there is an upgrade for mutual aid, a MABAS box alarm, or just a 2nd alarm. That depends on the town and whether it is part of MABAS.

Cedar Rapids is a large enough town that not all of their engines were at that fire so they still had some companies available for other alarms. I don’t know if any companies changed quarters into Cedar Rapids since they still had available companies. It’s good that Cedar Rapids runs with a tower ladder as some departments don’t.

Does Station 7 still operate with a single quint or do they run with an engine and truck?

#2 by Tim on April 7, 2021 - 9:13 PM