Residents of James Street, central Kingston, assist firemen from the York Park, Trench Town and Half-Way Tree fire stations to battle a blaze yesterday. - IAN ALLEN/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
FIRE YESTERDAY morning gutted two tenement yards in central Kingston, leaving 30 persons homeless.
Damage was estimated at $4.5 million.
From as early as 6:50 a.m., thick, black smoke billowed into the morning sky, and men dressed only in underpants held hoses and were a welcome help to firefighters who tried to extinguish the blaze. It was eventually contained an hour after it began.
During the blaze, some residents scampered to salvage furniture and other personal items. A teary-eyed 38-year-old Doreen Williams, who had a baby a week ago, lost her belongings in the fire. "Ah hear my cousin bawl out fire, and when ah come out, it was over next door," she recalled. "So everybody start running an' a throw water and pull out de things (furniture, appliances, clothing, etc.) dem," she said.
Victor Cummings, the Central Kingston Member of Parliament who was quick on the scene, supported residents' claim that the lack of adequate resources restricted the efforts of fire personnel to extinguish the blaze.
TRUCK RAN OUT OF WATER
"One of the fire trucks ran out of water, and the other trucks didn't come in time," he said. "That contributed to the problem but the community really came out and they saved a lot of stuff."
However, Assistant Superintendent Alfred Roach of the York Park Fire Station denied claims that the fire unit ran out of water. "I don't know of any trucks running out of water," he said.
The assistant superintendent added that when the fire department arrived at the scene, there was no workable fire hydrant, although there were back-up fire units.
Units from the Trench Town and Half-Way Tree fire stations helped to put out the blaze.
