Firefighters in Estacada rescued a woman they said was trapped in a septic tank possibly for two to three days. They said she had to be flown to the hospital.
Rescuers said they found her lying in raw sewage with her face just above it in a tank outside her rural home, which is about five miles northeast of Estacada. Officials said she lives there alone.
"It can be definitely a scary situation, especially sitting at the bottom of a septic tank and you don't know that anybody's coming to get you," Nick Wettlaufer, an engineer/paramedic, told a KATU reporter Thursday. Many homes in rural areas use underground septic tanks as a kind of private sewer to process and treat waste.
"Nobody would've heard her up there," said Richard Anderson, a division chief for Estacada Rural Fire District No. 69, which responded to the incident. "The next closest house was a couple of thousand feet away."
KTVL-TV Channel 10
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An electrical fire broke out in a garage on Fruitdale Road on Wednesday.
On Aug. 21 at 2:15 p.m., the Coos Bay Fire Department responded to reports of a fire in a garage of a single family dwelling on Fruitdale Road. According to a press release from the CBFD, once firefighters arrived they found smoke coming from the corner of the garage.
“Firefighters were able to make access and assure the house was clear of occupants, extinguish the fire and check for extension into the rest of the house,” the release said. “The house suffered minor damage due to smoke and fire.”
The total damage was $1,500, the release said.
“After an investigation, it was determined that the cause of the fire was an extension cord that had malfunctioned that was used along the side of the garage,” the release said. “No injuries were reported.”
The Worldlink.com
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During fire season, the Oregon Department of Forestry uses various water sources to fight fires. From fire hydrants to even water tenders. However, when fire hydrants are not available and water tenders run out of water, ODF firefighters resort to water drafting to suppress fires.
Water drafting allows firefighters to pull water from local water sources such as rivers, lakes, ponds, irrigation ditches, and even pools. Drafting is extremely beneficial for departments in rural areas such as the Oregon Department of Forestry where firefighters have minimal access to fire hydrants.
“It's very beneficial because most of the fires we go on are going to be in areas where we don’t have access to fire hydrants or some of our water tenders may not be able to get to. So, we’re able to get water from rivers, lakes, ponds, and even people’s pools sometimes," ODF Firefighter Josh Stevens says.
KTVL-TV Channel 10
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La Pine Rural Fire District crews spent a busy Wednesday evening responding to a reported shop on fire, a rollover crash and a medical call -- all within a four-minute span, an official said.
The dispatch call came at 7:04 p.m. to the shop fire in the 52600 block of Huntington Road, Fire Chief Mike Supkis said.
At the same time, firefighters were responding to a high-impact single-vehicle rollover at milepost 4 on Huntington Road, resulting in one person being taken to St. Charles Bend, Supkis said.
Crews also were responding to a second medical call, for chest pain.
Supkis said firefighters responding to the crash were able to divert one unit to the structure fire and arrived less than a minute after the 911 call, making a quick knockdown on a fire burning in a large shop building. Nearly a dozen firefighters responded there to finish putting out the blaze.
KTVZ-TV NewsChannel 21
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The Ashland CERT Team expanded it's community disaster preparedness with the help of grant funding from the Homeland Security.
In order to apply, anyone who is interested must meet specific criteria. This grant is made available through state funding and made available to different agencies, making it very competitive to receive.
With the funding, the CERT Team purchased a new Conex box to store emergency supplies. While having supplies stored in case of an emergency, such as flooding or natural disasters is not new, the Conex Box is new to the team. They said everything was previously stored inside a closet at the Jackson County Fire District Number Five Station One.
The supplies inside are used to help volunteers assist any agency that may need contribution.
KTVL-TV Channel 10
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