Steve Neavling of Motor City Muckraker reports that malfunctioning equipment at the Detroit Fire Department can be deadly.
Neavling writes Wednesday:
For the second time in five days, someone died in a house fire after Detroit firefighters were delayed because their alert systems malfunctioned.
By the time firefighters arrived to the blaze on Detroit’s east side at 1 a.m. today, there was little they could do as flames rolled through the house at 2069 Lawley near I-75 and the Davison Freeway. Firefighters said they lost critical time because the systems that alert them to fires did not work.
On Saturday morning, the alert systems also failed to work at Engine 1’s quarters downtown, causing a four-minute delay as a 73-year-old man burned to death in a house fire on Commonwealth in the blossoming neighborhood of Woodbridge.
The alert systems have been malfunctioning sporadically, but Mayor Mike Duggan’s office said the alarms were working properly when they were tested this morning. The administration is investigating, but firefighters said no one has talked to them about the system failures.
