The West Grove Fire Company was dispatched today to assist the Cochranville Fire Company (Station 27) on a reported woods fire on Faggs Manor Road in Londonderry Township. The fire turned out to be a multi-hour response involving fire units from Cochranville, West Grove, Oxford and Avondale.

What began as a trash pile burning behind a large mushroom farming complex, began to spread into nearby woods, prompting a 911 call to the Chester County 911 Center, which dispatched for a woods fire just after 930am. First to arrive was the ambulance crew from West Grove whose crew reported a small fire area moving into the woods, and raised concerns about exposure to small pump house structure at risk from the trash pile burning.

En-route and hearing the report of exposures, Chief 22 asked for an upgraded building response to protect exposures. This next dispatched added an engine from Oxford (21) and a Tanker from Avondale (23). Chief arrived to assume the command role from his Incident Command unit, with Captain 27 running operations.

Engine 22, Brush 12, Tanker 22 and Engine 32 all responded from the WGFC. Utility 27 arrived on the scene. Chief 22 requested that Engine 22 lay in a supply line from up on the mushroom wharf and driveway, down the hill to the pump house location.

Engine 22's crew, assisted by crews from 27, deployed 1-3/4" and 2-1/2" attack lines to knock down the fire in the large pile of burning debris and attempt to stop the fire that had now taken the roof of the pump house building. Tanker 22 picked up the dropped supply line and supplied it's 3000 gallons of water, working as a "nurse" tanker. Engine 32 arrived to pick up the Water Supply assignment, supplying its 1,000 gallons to Tanker 22.

Engine 21-1's crew joined the fire attack, along with arriving crews on 27-5 and Rescue 22.

The water supply operation utilized tankers 27-5 and 23. However, due to the high volume of water being used, Tanker 21 was placed into position providing a larger 6,500 gallon nurse supply, fed through Engine 21-1, and then through Tanker 22.

In total, approximately 23,000 gallons of water were used to extinguish the stubborn trash fire, which heavily damaged the adjacent pump house. Tankers were resupplied at a hydrant near 796 & 926.

Hockessin's tanker stood by at Station 23, and Engine 12 stood by at the scene, along with Rescue 23. The Chester County Fire Marshal (FM101) was on scene.

Although Command placed the fire under control at 1032am, units worked on scene until just after 12 noon, and all stations had extensive hose and truck clean up until around 1pm. 7