"... Respond to a Barn Fire at ...."
These words would strike some form of fear, apprehension, and determination that this type of fire would be an "all nighter" and a difficult fire in the minds of the Somers Volunteer Firefighters when they were paged for a barn fire. Typically, barns in the past were constructed with heavy wooden timbers, with siding and roof material of wood planks. Most were constructed before the turn of the 20th century and had seen over a hundred years of sun, wind, rain and snow. Their exposure to the elements had made the wood well dried out, a tinder box so to speak. Many barns were filled with hay, machinery, and various containers of oils or greases, and pesticides used in the business of farming. All this fire load contributed to a dangerously smokey, rapidly growing, hot fire that usually meant this was going to be a long hard job when the firefighters went to work.
The Barn
The training barn had served its purpose for the farmers which owned it. It was old, drafty, and had been well used during its lifetime.It had been cleaned out of virtually everything but a few pallets and wooden crates used for shipping crops. This training burn illustrates how quickly and hot a barn can burn.
The Training Burn
The initial fires were set in the north east and southeast corners of the loft, using only wood and paper found in the building.
The open barn door gave new firefighters an excellent opportunity to safely observe from a distance how a fire grows. The photos directly above is less than three minutes from time of fire inception. The fire on the left, the northeast corner, was set approximately one minute sooner than the fire in the southeast corner. Winds were from the west, blowing directly into the open barn door. Hose crews were positioned to protect the wires on poles to the east of the building from burning.
As the Fire Grew
Outside, the first wall to be breeched was the south wall. In less than five minutes from the time the photographs above were taken, the fire was inside the barn almost from the roof top to the ground.
