Man killed in house fire in The Dalles

One man was killed in a house fire in The Dalles on Thursday morning. Before 9 a.m., several counties sent firefighters to a house fire on the 900 block of West 19th Street. According to the Wasco County Sheriff’s Office, the fire was under control around 9:15 a.m. An evacuation zone was set up one block in all directions from the intersection of west 18th Street and Mt. Hood Street for about two hours. It was lifted around 11:15 a.m. According to The Dalles police, the man killed was a guest and not the owner of the home. The house, as well as several cars, are a loss. Police confirmed ammunition was in the home. The cause of the fire has not yet been released.
KPTV FOX 12 Portland

Yachats fire district has first cash carryover in years after financial struggles erased by levy approvals

Voter-approved tax levies in 2022 and 2023 are making the job of the Yachats Rural Fire Protection District’s budget committee much easier. After five years of needing loans to make ends meet between infusions of property taxes, the fire district’s budget committee learned Monday that the district should have a healthy cash carryover of $465,000 when the fiscal year ends June 30. That carryover could grow to $597,000 by the end of the 2024-25 fiscal year, according to the budget prepared by district administrators Frankie Petrick and Shelby Knife and approved unanimously Monday by the budget committee. After years of financial struggles, the district is in much better financial shape after voters last November renewed a five-year tax levy of 61 cents per $1,000 assessed property value after also approving a new, much larger levy of $1.59 in 2022.
Yachats News

Clackamas Fire to start training with virtual reality headsets

VIDEO/PHOTOS: Clackamas Fire Department is getting some major upgrades thanks to virtual reality or VR. The station's brand new VR simulation program was funded by the State Homeland Security Program (SHSP) grant. The department is now the second fire agency to use this program in the U.S., a department in Oklahoma was the first. “When you go into a virtual space, your brain thinks you’re actually in there and it’s pretty compelling," Division Chief Rick Huffman told KATU. “What we would do is use a scenario that is extremely high risk, that doesn’t happen very often and is hard to train on.” Huffman says there's not always a lot of opportunities to train on specific scenarios that don't happen in Oregon everyday, and the new VR headsets help fill that gap.
KATU-TV ABC 2 Portland

Portland Fire & Rescue Responds to Electrocution and Forty Foot Fall From Power Tower in Sellwood

PHOTO: On May 15, 2024 at approximately 5:05 pm, Portland Fire & Rescue was dispatched to an area along the railroad tracks near Sellwood Riverfront Park for an individual who was reportedly climbing a steel powerline tower at this location, was electrocuted, and then fell forty feet into some bushes on the ground below. Per PGE, the line at the top of this tower was a 57,000 volt powerline. Per one witness, this individual was attempting to take a selfie photo when they fell. Another witness told dispatchers that they heard a “transformer blow” and then saw a person fall from the tower to the ground. Per an off-duty paramedic who was on scene when the fall occurred, the individual—in a stroke of incredibly good luck--was conscious and breathing immediately after the fall.
City of Portland

Oregon agencies expecting another severe wildfire season as ’the drought still persists’

VIDEO: In seconds, firefighters for Marion County Fire District 1 are out of their truck, hooking up a hose and lugging it into a field. "When you call, the public calls, we want to be there and get to moving within 60, 90 seconds," said Kyle McMann, fire chief for Marion County Fire District 1. This is week two of training for McMann's firefighters who are preparing for wildfire season, which is typically May through August. Training is critical for these crews, as they're structural firefighters the remainder of the year. About ten minutes down the road from the fire station, state agencies from across Oregon met at the capital on Wednesday to discuss the impending wildfire season. "July, August, September — that’s really the three-month stretch," said Chris Cline, Fire Protection Chief for the Oregon Department of Forestry (ODF).
KGW-TV NBC 8 Portland