House has a full basement, partially finished. 1st / 2nd due teamed up to get a line in operation through the bulkhead door.
Oil heat, 275gallon tank in the basement although the Fire Marshal confirmed it did not fail.
Oily, sooty windows are from smoke condensating on the windows -- fire was definitely in the "decay" stage after having been burning for 5+ hours before the 911 call (typical 1/4 acre lot suburban area...right on a main road, so no reason for people to have not seen smoke earlier...just a fairly slow burning fire in a tight house).
Like some of the guys above indicated, still kind of hairy to use PPV since there was a lot of heat, and we didn't have a good handle on where the fire, if any, was remaining. Knew there had been some flames on two levels (basement & first) which had been knocked down. Remember the house had been stewing for hours, so it was pretty warm everywhere.
Crews wanted to start aggressively opening up the walls and ceiling, but couldn't see. And the floor was spongy in one spot (the area of origin) so they were moving carefully on the first floor.
So like some of the posters above, crew went to the roof. Notice the smoke from the ridge vent doesn't look that menancing at all...

Edited to add credit for this photo to Josh Maloney...I'll post his website later but I don't want any cheaters for now
Oil heat, 275gallon tank in the basement although the Fire Marshal confirmed it did not fail.
Oily, sooty windows are from smoke condensating on the windows -- fire was definitely in the "decay" stage after having been burning for 5+ hours before the 911 call (typical 1/4 acre lot suburban area...right on a main road, so no reason for people to have not seen smoke earlier...just a fairly slow burning fire in a tight house).
Like some of the guys above indicated, still kind of hairy to use PPV since there was a lot of heat, and we didn't have a good handle on where the fire, if any, was remaining. Knew there had been some flames on two levels (basement & first) which had been knocked down. Remember the house had been stewing for hours, so it was pretty warm everywhere.
Crews wanted to start aggressively opening up the walls and ceiling, but couldn't see. And the floor was spongy in one spot (the area of origin) so they were moving carefully on the first floor.
So like some of the posters above, crew went to the roof. Notice the smoke from the ridge vent doesn't look that menancing at all...

Edited to add credit for this photo to Josh Maloney...I'll post his website later but I don't want any cheaters for now

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