Posted on 12/03/2002 6:32:19 AM PST by Iron Eagle
Edited on 05/07/2004 7:38:55 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
Published in the Asbury Park Press 12/03/02 Fire alerts authorities to nearly 500 weapons By MICHAEL CLANCY STAFF WRITER FAIR HAVEN -- Three dump trucks removed an arsenal of live ammunition and almost 500 weapons -- all of them apparently held legally -- which police found in a home after the fire department responded to a chimney fire and the homeowner threatened the fire chief with a rifle, authorities said yesterday.
(Excerpt) Read more at app.com ...
If the round is chambered it has the potential to become a projectile. Rounds in a guns magazine will not become projectiles if over-heated.
If the fire is contained within the chimney, the chimney is free of leaks, and the damper seals at least reasonably well, why does it matter how well sealed the rest of the house is? While careful inspection of the situation is necessary to determine whether a chimney fire has self-extinguished before either causing the chimney to fail or getting it hot enough to ignite materials outside it, I don't see how those conditions have anything to do with how well ventilated the rest of the house is.
Using a fire extinguisher may have put out the fire, but it would've been extremely smoky in the house.
There may not have been much smoke in the house from the chimney fire, but what about the fire that was presumably burning in the fireplace when the chimney fire started? Wood which has not burned down to coals will give off a lot of smoke when it's extinguished. More smoke, in fact, than when it was burning (wood, when heated, gives off a flammable mixture of gas and particulates--smoke; the orange flames from a typical fire are actually burning smoke. If a wood fire is extinguished quickly, it will continue to give off smoke until the wood cools. If the house was tightly sealed, had he opened the doors & windows after he thought the fire was out and wasn't out completely would've ventilated that fire nicely.
The proper "first aid" for a chimney fire would be to close the damper as quickly as possible, then extinguish the fire in the fireplace as quickly as possible and vent the place as quickly as possible to dissipate the smoke [which order to do the latter steps in would depend upon the relative placements of the fireplace, the fire extinguishing materials, and the nearby windows/doors].
If this guy didn't have a fire extinguisher in the house, or didn't know or couldn't remember where it was, or thought he could put out the fire with a few buckets of water (I doubt if he had a hose handy inside), and panicked, he may not have been able to make sure a fire in the fireplace was out, or even thought to close the damper. Of course, if the fire was already up into the chimney, closing the damper would've only contained the fire in the fireplace, but not the fire above it.
I don't think the homeowner did, in this case.
You want to make sure you rights are preserved, after all. And if the fire department do show up because a neighbor saw the fire, make sure you stand in the doorway of your house screaming, "GO AWAY! I'LL DO THIS MYSELF!"
I'd be all for it. When I was 12, my mom called an ambulance for her brother who had been very sick with some sort of virus. He had been convulsing and had lost consciousness. By the time paramedics came and checked him out a little, they decided he needed to be taken to the emergency room. But he had come to by then. He absolutely refused to go or be taken to a hospital. He flat out refused, and let it be known in no uncertain terms. He was like that. My mom tried to persuade him to cooperate. They were just trying to help him, she pleaded. He adamently refused. My mom had no choice but to relent, and respect his wishes, no matter how self destructive. She said to the paramedics, "Well, I'm so sorry I called you and wasted your time, but my brother obviously doesn't wish to go. Thank you and good night".
Thinking that would be the end of it, imagine our surprise when the paramedic informed us it was no longer our (me, my mom and uncle) decision, it was now HIS decision (the paramedic), and my uncle was going to the hospital against his wishes. Well, to make a long story short, and near dying man was physically restrianed and taken against his will literally kicking and screaming, and my mom was almost handcuffed and arrested for trying to defend her broter and honor his wishes.
This all happened in my uncle's OWN HOME. Pathetic.
That's irrelevant. His house was reported as being on fire. The FD likely didn't knock because most people become unconscious quickly from the smoke, and the fire never even reaches most of the house. The FD has to break in to save them. IMO that's what they were doing, and this guy responded unreasonably.
"When they order you out of your own home?"
Where's the malicious intent? IMO, the fire chief wanted him out because as a firefighter, he wanted to remove the risk to human life by getting the human away from the fire.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Please show me :
1. Anything in the news article indicating that the Fire Chief had a warrant. -or-
2. Any Amendment to the Constitution that overrides the one above for Fire Chiefs.
Thanks.
If the fire had reached any walls or ceiling, this guy would have had a really big problem. That is probably not the case, however.
Of course, if the fire was already up into the chimney, closing the damper would've only contained the fire in the fireplace, but not the fire above it.
Uh, the first unintentional part of the fire was in the chimney (it was preceded of course by an intentional fire in the fireplace). And closing the damper would extinguish that fire quickly(*) but left the one in the fireplace burning. If the chimney fire was extinguished before it spread, extinguishing the fire in the fireplace without making a mess would be the hard part, and even that should be doable without excessive damage to anything (some smoke damage would be inevitable, but probably nothing that couldn't be cleaned off or lived with).
(*) Fires can burn very well in narrow vertical tubes that are open at both ends, but not well at all if either end is closed. If the top end is plugged, the spent air will accumulate in the top of the tube and work its way down until there is not enough oxygen above the fuel source to support combustion. If the bottom end is plugged, the intensity of the fire will be limitted by the requirement that fresh air enter the tube from the top in the direction opposite the convection currents. If the tube is wide enough relative to its length it may be possible to establish an airflow pattern that supports combustion (e.g. burning a candle in a jar). If the tube is comparatively narrow, however, convection will be relatively ineffective.
Because maybe he made a mistake?
I agree with the other posters in that the more likely chain of events had this guy grabbing at the nearest firearm to at least TRY and save something of his collection from the fire.
Very likely too. But isn't it just as understandable that the firefighter misunderstood this? He didn't know it wasn't loaded... did the guy say "I'm gonna take as many of my guns with me as possible"? I would have, to avoid the misunderstanding that has indeed taken place, if that is what he was doing.
ain't that what you are doing just the same as the rest of us?
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