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Health of 25 firefighters checked after Yarmouth fire

E-mail|Link|Comments () July 10, 2009 04:26 PM

(Sara and Catherine Wilcox)

Smoke rose from the bog utility building this afternoon.

By Jack Nicas, Globe Correspondent

At least 25 firefighters were taken to Cape Cod Hospital today because of concerns they may have been exposed to hazardous materials while fighting a blaze in Yarmouth, officials said.

Officials were worried that fertilizer and other chemicals may have burned, generating dangerous fumes, during the fire inside the cranberry bog utility building.

It was not immediately clear how the fire, which required Yarmouth to seek assistance from several surrounding departments, started.

Yarmouth Fire Chief Michael Walker ordered every firefighter on the scene to the hospital as a precautionary measure, said Barnstable Fire Lieutenant Donald O’Neill. A school bus was brought to the scene to transport them.

Chief Walker also drove himself to the hospital, Yarmouth dispatcher Chris Ruello said.

Neighbor Sara Wilcox, 24, said she believed a propane tank had exploded during the fire. A bog worker’s pit bull, Spike, was in the building when the fire started, but he made it out safely, Wilcox said.

The bog worker left the building to get a drink at his nearby home when he saw the smoke and rushed back, said Wilcox’s 17-year-old sister, Catherine, who said she saw the fire at 11:20 a.m.

The smell of the smoldering building, which held equipment to harvest the adjacent cranberry bog, has filled the area, Sara Wilcox said.

"You can smell the manure burning and the propane," she said. "There are some not-too-pretty scents lingering around here."

The fire was still smoldering by 3:30, Catherine Wilcox said. Ruello, the Yarmouth dispatcher, called the scene “still very active.”