The story of this fire continues to centre on the unaccounted for male, which is fine, but I would expect to hear some comment on the actual handling of the fire.

The information to date, either from private individuals or the CBC news, is that it took 30 Minutes for the PG Fire Department to arrive at the site of the fire. I have heard that some individuals drove from town and arrived at the Airport before the fire engines.


In addition there was some comment in the CBC articles that because of the protocol between the Air;port Authority and the City, the Airport fire personell were unable to fight the fire.

In any event we need to know the following:

Are the Airport Authority Personel trained to fight structural fires???

If not, and if it is the responsiblity of the Prince George fire department to fight these fires, is 30 Minutes an acceptable time to respond to a fire.

One of the 911 calls was placed at 230pm and the person making the call stated that the PG Engine did not arrive until 3PM.

I dont think anyone should be kidding themselves that there is not a serious problem here. What would have happened if this fire had started or spread to the Terminal Building, or worse yet to the fueling area??

Seems to me years ago there were firemen stationed at the Airport who could fight structual fires. Were they removed??? If so why??? Who made the decisions??

Keep in mind that we are trying to sell this Airport as an International Airport, and hoping to have Wide Body Cargo jets land here, transfer cargo, and have business locate in the industrial park.

This can hardly take place without good fire protection.

We need some answers/

I agree that there are some answers needed, What ever happened to common sense. If my neighbors house was on fire and I had a garden hose I would at least try. If the fire started (as stated) in a second storey offfice how about knocking out a window and filling the room with foam from one of your high priced fire trucks. If common sense is so far removed I would hate to depend on the airport fire dept if it involved a plane accident.

CharlieB, you fail to understand the liability issues. The airport fire crew does not have the training or the equipment to fight structural fires.

If they had made an attempt, and some people got hurt or killed in the process, they would be opening themselves to a big insurance mess for themselves and their families, not to mention a huge public inquiry as to why they were fighting fires they shouldn't be.

Yes, maybe it's not 'right' in many people's eyes, but this is the unfortunate reality.

As far as response time, I have heard (depending on the source) that it took either 15 minutes or 30 to respond. I would guess the truth is somewhere in the middle, and considering the distance involved, it seems reasonable.

"Seems to me years ago there were firemen stationed at the Airport who could fight structual fires. Were they removed??? If so why??? Who made the decisions??"

I'm guessing that the cost of keeping dedicated structural firecrews + equipment & maintenance at the airport 24/7/365 was too high considering the risk of a fire occurring is almost nil. How many fires have occurred at the airport since it opened besides this recent one?

I dont disagree with you MrPG, however we could say the same about the 4 firehalls in the Prince George area, and the 60 odd firefighters. If we deal strictly with the number of actual fires attended by these four stations, one would have to come to the conclusion that the cost is prohibitive in regards to the risks involved, however because society needs protection, and so do insurance companies we provide this service.

The same service I beleive was provided at the Airport for years, and was then discontinued, probably sometime around when the Airport Authority was established.

If the expansion of the industrial area West of the Airport is ever actually built, and if we expect business to locate their, along with the anal thinking of Insurance companies, or (((Risk Management People))) some sort of Fire Protection will have to be established.

I suspect that the Airport Authority personel would continue to be responsible for Aviation fires, and therefore the responsibility for structural fires would be the responsibility of the City.

This probably means that in addition to taxpayers paying $50 Million for the Airport Terminal, Parking Lot Expansion, and Runway Expansion, we will also have to pick up the tab for $ $21 Million for the Boundry Road cut off, and then once we have some industry located there provide an updated Fire Protection Unit as a cost of Millions.

Because of Jurisdictional problems the volunteer departments of Fernie, Buckhorn, Pindale, cannot provide this service.

Anyone who thinks that an investment of tax dollars that will be in the area of $71,000,000.00 by the end of 2012, and has very little if any chance of returning any jobs of any consequence, is just kidding themselves.

The whole Airport Authority concept in Prince George along with the attendent hype, is just so much BS. The fact that it will benefit some private business, at a huge cost to taxpayers, is what it is all about.

Hey ..... how many crashes have occurred at the airport since it opened that ended up needing the fire fighting capacity of the crew on site?

One last time .... people can learn how to do more than one thing at a time, especially if they are waiting for something to happen.

In case you have not seen these pictures yet. They tell a bit more of the story.

http://www.flightsource.ca/blog/flightdeck/2009/12/19/nt-air-hanger-destroyed-by-fire

In my opinion, looking at those pictures, this building would have been saved had it been protected by sprinklers.

Barring that, in my opinion, this building could likely have been saved if it had been:

1. attended to by fire crews within 10 minutes of the fire being noticed. (Look at the size of the fire when the first picture was taken.)

2. Enough fire trucks had been dispatched to tackle both the fire on the inside of the perimeter walls while training water on the trusses near their bearing points to prevent them from catching fire.

I think those are classic pictures. Great for scenario setting exercises for fire training.

Sequence through the pictures, provide a site plan and generate a 3d computerized model that shows the fire progression and, after each next time sequence slide is shown, discuss next tactic.

BTW, the picture with a whisp of smoke visible and no firefighters in sight yet is time stamped 3:39 pm. By the amount of daylight, that seems to be about right.

According to this site, the call was made at 14:36, one hour before this picture time stamp.

The report goes on to say that the fire departmetn arrived when the building was engulfed in flames.

I would like to see the report when it gets done to see what it says the timelines were.

http://www.flightsource.ca/blog/flightdeck/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/IMG_1397.JPG

That is the picture time stamped at 15:39hrs. It clearly shows light smoke coming from the farthest window or opening on the second floor. Perhaps the picture was time stamped as being 15:39hrs rather than 14:39 since the camera owner did not set back the time on the camera when PDT switched to PST. That would then fit in with the reported time of the 911 call.

MrPG wrote: "CharlieB, you fail to understand the liability issues. The airport fire crew does not have the training or the equipment to fight structural fires.

If they had made an attempt, and some people got hurt or killed in the process, they would be opening themselves to a big insurance mess for themselves and their families, not to mention a huge public inquiry as to why they were fighting fires they shouldn't be."

I have been thinking about this for the last little while...I think MrPG has a valid point about a possible reason for the lack of response from the airport fire crew. However, I have a question of my own. Are there not fire suppression requirements for the insurance/liability/risk management on the structures located on the property? There must be liability issues on the other side as well. One would think that with all the hazardous variables on airport property there would be better emergency response by all parties involved.
From what I have read to date, it seems that the airport authority is ill-equipped to deal with such a fire. Like gus keeps asking, why is that? I think it is completely unacceptable. It is a shame that it takes a tragedy in order to examine emergency preparedness.

Palopu wrote: "The story of this fire continues to centre on the unaccounted for male, which is fine, but I would expect to hear some comment on the actual handling of the fire."

I concur. Perhaps this info is unavailable due to the ongoing investigation?

It raises the greater question. How prepared is the City and its various emergency organizations to deal with a larger emergency if jurisdictional situations such as this do not allow people to react when there is a gap that has been discovered at the time of the actual emergency?

I just cannot fathom that someone could not have gone in to assist with waht appears to have been a small fire likely in a single room. Where were the fire extinguishers in the building? People were there to rescue valuables such as planes and documents, but they were not instructed in how to deal with a fire?

Were there fire extinguishers around? Were there fire alarm pull stations? There do not appear to have been smoke detectors hooked up to a monitored alarm system. How primitive was the fire detection and fire suppression system in the building?

amazing to me how millions of $$ worth of firefighting equipment can't be used because someone isn't trained on sturcture fires. More worried about covering ones butt. How about the liabilities of going into a burning building to retreive planes documents etc. I have watched the fire equipment they have during practice . Seems to me they wouldn't have had to get very close to the burning building. It is better to do something. Very simple point and shoot idiot. I think it is a disgrace.