By Nate Leskovic
Times Staff
4/17/08
A daytime fire in a three-story multi-family home on Sheldon Street that killed a 43-year-old man on April 14 was the fifth multi-alarm fire in town. It was the second fatal blaze since January.
“Fire prevention could have eliminated this type of fire,” says Fire Chief Malcolm Larson. “If you look at just about any of the fires, they stem from maintenance.”
A dryer on the second floor of the home apparently sparked this fire. The victim, Richard Shannon, was the only person at the 58 Sheldon St. dwelling when firefighters arrived at noon. Engine 2 from the East Milton station attacked the blaze immediately, according to Larson, but found the man in his third-floor bedroom without a pulse. He was transported to Milton Hospital but did not survive.
Larson says the situation might have been even worse had the fire occurred when one of the town’s fire engines was out of service because of budget shortfalls, which is the case one-third of the time. However, the increased danger, he says, would have been to firefighters.
A joint investigation by the fire and police departments, as well as the state Fire Marshal, determined this fire was likely caused by lint that ignited in the dryer vent pipe. The flames damaged the second floor, where the dryer was located, but heat and smoke traveled to the third floor.
In February, Robert Kane, 59, died in a fire that gutted a home on Mathaurs Street.
Careless smoking destroyed a Brush Hill Road mansion earlier this month, although no one was injured. A cooking fire caused more than $100,000 in damages to a Canton Avenue home in March. The fatal fire on Mathaurs Street was complicated by clutter in the house and on the property, according to fire officials.
According to the state Fire Marshal, 97 dryer fires in 2006 in Massachusetts resulted in one death, two resident injuries, two firefighter injuries and millions of dollars in damages.
The Sheldon Street home was recently renovated, had working smoke detectors and a fire escape, Larson says, adding that the fatality is something of a mystery.
“It wasn’t a house you could identify as a problem,” he says. “It’s really tragic and difficult to understand how it happened.”
All three Milton engines and the ladder truck responded. The three-alarm blaze brought in aid from Quincy and Randolph.
More firefighters would not have saved the victim, according to Larson, however fewer would have been dangerous for those tackling the blaze.
“Had Engine 1 been out of service, then the crew from East Milton station would have been very deep into this house and you wouldn’t have had any backup for quite a while,” he says. “It’s very frustrating for me and all the Milton firefighters going day-to-day depending on luck. We should be able to depend on sound, safe, firefighting practices.”
Last year, the fire department absorbed $100,000 in un-budgeted raises. As a result, one engine was taken out of service one-third of the time. Larson says next year’s budget situation also remains uncertain.
“Firefighters aren’t good at waiting. They’re going to show up to a fire and go in and try to make rescues. They’re assuming that there’s help coming. When you don’t have enough people, you don’t have enough to address all the tasks. That equals an unsafe fire ground,” the chief says.