Three local volunteer fire departments responded to an excavator fire on Monday, October 28. Stuart Volunteer Fire Department was among those dispatched to a heavy equipment fire reported about halfway up the mountain.
Patrick Springs Volunteer Fire Department Assistant Chief Clint Weidhaas said it was a track hoe, a type of excavator, with a rock hammer operated by Kokosing, a contractor doing roadwork for the U.S. 58 project.
“The machine caught on fire while it was being operated. The operator attempted to extinguish the fire with fire extinguishers, like two or three, and was unsuccessful. It became fully involved,” he said.
Weidhaas said Stuart Fire was toned out and Patrick Springs and Meadows of Dan Volunteer Fire Department assisted in extinguishing the fire.
“Due to the large amount of hydraulic and diesel fuel that this type of equipment holds, it makes fire suppression difficult without the use of firefighting foam. We used 25 gallons of firefighting foam agent mixed in the water to help extinguish the fire,” he said.
In those types of fires, Weidhaas said water alone does pretty much nothing.
“In fact, Stuart Fire put their 300 gallons of water from their brush truck and Patrick Springs we put 300 gallons of water from our brush truck, and it did not put it out,” he said.
Due to the terrain, Weidhaas said it was kind of difficult to get the equipment up to the fire. This caused a delay in fire suppression.
“Once we got Patrick Springs’ tanker up there, we had 1,800 gallons of water. I hooked up the foam system and started mixing the foam in with the water and that’s done on the handline. Once we got that flowing with the foam in with the water, we were immediately able to get the fire put out,” he said.
Weidhaas added it took about 15 minutes to knock the fire down once the departments arrived on scene.
Stuart had two personnel, one engine, and a brush truck on scene, Patrick Springs had five personnel, a brush truck, and a tanker, and Meadows of Dan responded with a mini-pumper, and a tanker with two personnel.
While the cause of the fire is unknown, Weidhaas said when the track hoe operator opened the engine compartment “the fire was located in a hydraulic oil system area.”
No one was injured due to the fire.
Weidhaas estimated a track hoe costs about $450,000.
“It’s a big machine, so of course that’s a big loss for a construction company like that,” he said.
