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In Hyannis, firefighters wait for an Earl who never showed up

E-mail|Link|Comments () September 4, 2010 08:06 AM

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By Erin Ailworth, Globe Staff

HYANNIS -- The first storm-related emergency call rang through the local fire-rescue station's dispatch center at 12:57 a.m. today, long after the rain began pelting down in earnest. The beefed-up 19-man firefighting crew had been on duty for hours.

"Just hang out and wait. It's part of the job," said firefighter Paul Medeiros. "Wait for the worst. Hope for the best."

Even as Hurricane Earl steadily lost strength, becoming a tropical storm midway through the night, the men stationed at the Hyannis Fire-Rescue station remained ready to assist anyone calling for help.

As the rain pounded down outside, dispatchers manned the call center, relaying emergencies to firefighters through a sound system wired throughout the station. At first, there was little action: a handful of routine medical calls trickled in, and later, a false fire alarm at a nearby bar where patrons were displeased by last call.

The waiting can be hard, especially when the worst was expected. Some kept busy with a movie, lounging in overstuffed easy chairs in a darkened TV room. A few gathered in the downstairs dining room to snack and share stories of storms past. Others used the free moments to rest.

"Everybody talks about how you work to get everything ready and then it doesn't hit. That's OK, because when it does it's horrible," said firefighter Brian Lawrence.

Fire chief Harold Brunelle said his crews average about 18 calls a day -- roughly 6,000 a year -- and because there's never any telling when the alarm will sound, they must always be vigilant.

"Crazy things can happen. Sometimes, sometimes it's when you don't think it's going to happen," Brunelle said. "That's the hardest part of the job. That's what makes it stressful because you never know what is coming in and it's, like, anticipation, anticipation. You don't ever relax."

Too often, calls arrive in clusters, like they did as Friday night washed into Saturday morning with the wind pushing rain in sheets across the streets of Hyannis. The first Earl-related call -- for flooding in a house on Garden Lane -- was followed three minutes later by a medical call for someone with trouble breathing.

So fire-rescue crews rolled out. On Garden Lane, homeowner Bill Merritt watched the recessed patio area in his yard fill with water, seeping over the blue tarps he'd used to try to stem the flow.

"You can't stop it," he admitted, explaining that this patio had flooded during other storms. "You just slow it down."

Firefighters left Merritt with a pump siphoning water to another area of his yard and returned to the station. Thirty minutes later, the storm intensified and two trucks and an ambulance were called out again.

At one house, firefighter Mike Dalmau comforted a distressed homeowner, whose basement was flooded with water that had streamed through the chimney.

"Don't cry, it's just a little water damage," he told the woman as emergency medical services supervisor Mike Medeiros stood by.

Sometimes, Mike Medeiros said, help is only one of the things the firefighters offer.

"Something like this," he explained, "you give a little reassurance."

Early this morning, calls continued to trickle in, mostly routine. Then, at 6 a.m. a lull in calls ended when people started waking up. The first two calls were from people who had discovered water in their basements.

Erin Ailworth can be reached at eailworth@globe.com.