The Roof, The Roof...
When I was typing the last sentences of this morning's entry, a house half a block down was burning down. The house fire started as a small grease fire at 3AM, promptly reported, and the first firemen started appearing in the scene at 4AM. Remember, I said before that it takes only about 15 minutes to get anywhere here on the island. The firefighters came to the scene more than a full hour after the fire was reported. Believe me, I was there, rubbernecking, and anyways, I had almost an unobstructed view of the blaze from the window from my room. The firefighters here are so pathetically inept that it's not even funny.
Since the fire started in just one room, it was manageable at first, and everyone in the building had time to evacuate. By the time the fire department responded, the whole house was ablaze. So a couple of firefighters came, stood around looking at the fire, smoking cigarettes and chewing tobacco, waiting for the water truck to come. Water truck came about thirty minutes later, 90 minutes after the report. So it comes barreling in the road, everyone gets down, and then runs around the truck then everyone got back in. Apparently the hole that the water comes out in was facing the other way from the fire. The truck tried to turn in the road, but since it was a narrow residential road, it couldn't, so after about 10 minutes of trying, they had to go around the block so that the truck would be pointing the other way. So everyone runs out from the truck again and starts to look busy for a few moments when I hear a loud commotion from the truck, with alot of yelling, and shouting and cursing. From what I gathered, the guy who was responsible for filling the truck with water before coming was AWOL, and the water truck had no water, and no one thought to check before they left the station, 90 minutes after the first call. So the truck goes barreling out again, looking for water.
By this time, the fire had engulfed the first house, and had moved to a second house and the firemen who were standing around were looking a bit...silly. So someone, remembering that they were firefighters, got the bright idea to tap into the water mains, connect some hoses onto it, and spray the fire with water until the truck, thus the pump, gets back. So a few firemen, instead of standing around looking at the fire smoking cigarettes and chewing tobacco, was standing around looking at the fire smoking cigarettes and chewing tobacco, spraying the fire with what amounted to glorified garden hoses, doing nothing to extinguish the fire but just making some steam, and looking even sillier.
By the time the water truck comes, it's 6 AM. One house is burned down to the ground, one is halfway there, and two more are on fire. So when everything is connected to the right holes and they round up enough people to hold the hose, it takes but 45 minutes to put out the fire. Well...there was nothing left to burn anyways. Fortunately, an asphalt road and another house was between my house and the blaze, so there was no direct effect from the fire for us. Well, the TV cable burned out, so we didn't have TV for a few hours, and the electricity for the house that was between us and the fire was directly connected to the house that caught on fire, so they didn't have power for like 6 hours. Rather trivial things I think, especially after watching 4 houses burn to the ground.
Hmph. At least no one died. Although while watching it, I felt the distinct urge to pitch a few of the morons from the fire department into the fire, see how they like it.