Chesterton Tribune

 

 

CFD sticks a fork in Wednesday: Garage fire, three accidents and a heart attack

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Wednesday was a whipsaw sort of a day for Chesterton firefighters.

It began at 10:03 a.m., Deputy Fire Chief Nate Williams said, when the CFD was dispatched to assist the Pine Township Volunteer FD at the scene of a garage fire in the 1600 block of Maple Street. Turns out a guy who was burning yard waste in a barrel managed to ignite leaf litter outside the barrel, on the ground, which in turn extended to the exterior of his neighbor’s garage.

PTVFD had the whole thing doused and under control by the time the CFD arrived on scene--the fire was confined to the garage’s siding, Williams said--so the engine crew just turned around and headed back to the station, at 10:13 a.m.

That crew was still en route to Pine Township, however, when, at 10:05 a.m., the CFD was toned out to a semi-vs.-pickup at Ind. 49 and East Oakhill Road, where it appears the pickup turned in front of the semi and got T-boned, Williams said. Responding to that crash was Fire Chief John Jarka and--thanks to an off-duty callback--Capt. Aimee Gilbert, who assisted EMS and then spread five bags of oil dry, some 250 pounds of it, on the roadway.

Jarka and Gilbert cleared that scene at 10:49 a.m.

The Chief and the Captain were still at the crash on Ind. 49, though, when the engine crew, having long since returned to the station, got sent back out again, at 11:41 a.m., this time to the 31 mile marker of eastbound I-94, where a passenger on a Greyhound bus bound for Detroit was complaining of chest pain.

The crew cleared that scene at 11:58 a.m.

And was promptly dispatched to a rollover crash at the intersection of U.S. Highway 20 and Waverly Road, to assist the Porter Fire Department with an extrication, Williams said. Also assisting: the Burns Harbor FD. Firefighters were forced to cut the vehicle’s roof and then peel it back like the lid of a sardine can to get at the driver, a woman and the vehicle’s only occupant.

The CFD cleared that scene at 12:30 p.m.

Then, at 8:50 p.m., firefighters were dispatched to another rollover crash, this one in the eastbound lanes of I-94, near the 29 mile marker, where one man was ejected and another partially ejected. The latter was airlifted to hospital by helicopter, Williams said, but the former--a large man of more than 400 pounds--exceeded the helicopter’s weight limit and was transported instead by ambulance to Methodist Hospital Northlake Campus in Gary.

The helicopter staged at the truck scales, Williams said, with the assistance of a crash truck dispatched to the scene from Porter County Regional Airport.

Finally, at 6:13 a.m. today, the CFD responded to the Bob Evans restaurant at Gateway and Ind. 49, after workers found that a malfunctioning carbon dioxide line serving a carbonated drink dispenser had leaked all over the floor, Williams said.

Firefighters shut off the C02 to the line and cleared the scene at 6:37 a.m.

 

 

Posted 4/21/2016

 
 
 
 

 

 

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