Grant Co. Fire District 7 keeps busy
Aug. 6 at about 5:30 a.m., GCFD7 responded to a report of a vehicle fire at 110 Daisy St S in Soap Lake. That was one of nearly a dozen calls so far in August with staff at the department expecting this to be a busy month over all.
COURTESY PHOTO/GCFD 7
GCFD7 Chief Kirk Sheppard said a travel trailer was fully engulfed on Aug. 6 in Soap Lake and GCFD7 quickly put out the fire.
Grant County Fire District 7 volunteer firefighter Jane Chambers sports one of the new headlamps the district just received through a grant from the Columbia Basin Foundation.
SOAP LAKE — Only 11 days into August, Grant County Fire District 7 has been busy. They have responded to several incidents and received the items from a grant they were selected for.
GCFD7 Chief Kirk Sheppard said so far this month the department has responded to 18 calls; 11 for EMS, two smoke investigations and five fires. He said they usually have 28 to 34 calls a month but in June and July they have had 57 calls each month. With the 18 calls as of Aug. 11, he expects them to be in the 50s by the end of the month.
“The thing in this community is probably 70% of our call volume is an EMS call,” Sheppard said.
One of the first major fire incidents this month for the department occurred on Aug. 2. At about 7:15 a.m GCFD7 was alerted to a report of an outside fire at Road B.5 NE, east of Soap Lake, according to a release by GCFD7.
Sheppard responded and upon arrival, he found a brush fire in progress that included an outbuilding and three vehicles all fully engulfed. GCFD7 responded with two brush trucks, he said. Mutual aid was requested from Ephrata Fire Department and GCFD13 for brush fire suppression. EFD also supplied a water tender to refill trucks already on scene. Once hotspots were managed, EFD and GCFD13 were released. At 9:30 a.m. all GCFD7 was cleared of the scene.
The release stated there were no injuries and the cause of the fire was deemed to be electrical in nature.
On Aug. 5, the district announced they had received their order of 22 new headlamps for their wildland firefighters. The headlamps were funded through a grant awarded to the fire department in June from the Columbia Basin Foundation.
On Aug. 6 at about 5:30 a.m., GCFD7 responded to a report of a vehicle fire at 110 Daisy St S. The release stated Sheppard observed a travel trailer that was fully engulfed and instructed GCFD7 to continue all response. Engine 71-15 responded with four firefighters, who quickly pulled hose and put water on the fire.
Grant County Public Utility District also responded and shut the power off because a power pole had also caught fire, the release said. Sheppard said with any structure fire, the PUD is automatically called to shut off power.
The fire was controlled and put out by personnel on scene. There was no damage done to the nearby structure and no injuries as a result of this incident. The scene was cleared at about 7 a.m.
Rebecca Pettingill may be reached at rpettingill@columbiabasinherald.com.
