Cell phone call leads rescuers man trapped in blazing warehouse
Published: April 7, 2008
A man trapped inside a blazing warehouse in Seneca used his cell phone to help firefighters find their way through the conflagration and rescue him.
Three firefighters were treated at Oconee Memorial Hospital and released, two for smoke inhalation and one for a deep cut to his hand, Seneca Fire Department Capt. Todd Williams said.
Another firefighter suffered a sprained ankle. The man, whose name wasn’t released Sunday, was expected to stay at the hospital overnight for more serious smoke-inhalation injuries, Williams said.
Fire officials don’t know yet how the fire started but plan to question the man who was trapped inside, Williams said.
A large chunk of the building — with “The Seneca Cotton Warehouse Co.” printed on the side in faded letters competing against “Class of …” graffiti — was a charred pile of debris, no longer smoking but with a distinct smell of what had happened in the early morning hours.
At 2:42 a.m., dispatchers received a call from a man who said he was trapped inside the abandoned warehouse and couldn’t find his way out, Williams said. Firefighters from five departments arrived to find a 2,000- square-foot side portion of the building in flames.
Dispatchers kept the man on the phone and communicated with firefighters looking for him inside the building. The man wasn’t sure where he was. The building is located between two sets of railroad tracks, and the man offered conflicting accounts of which side of the building he was on. The rescue took 25 minutes, Williams said.
“When you’re inside a burning building, that’s an extremely long time,” he said. “It took a while because he was disoriented, but the dispatchers were very professional and did a good job.”
Tragic memories of a fire at a Charleston sofa store that killed nine Charleston firefighters last June hung heavy in the minds of fire officials, Williams said.
The Seneca warehouse is abandoned save for a portion rented out for storage. Once the man and the firefighters were safe outside, Williams said, commanders decided to pull out of the building and begin “defensively” fighting the blaze.
“We didn’t want to take any chances with our guys to save nothing but some wood and furniture,” he said.
The Seneca station’s fire chief, Shane Phillips, was among the injured. One firefighter’s hand was “cut to the muscle” and required 15 stitches, Williams said.
It’s unclear why the man was inside the warehouse when the fire started, Williams said.
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