Local firefighters help battle fire, protect homes at Orange County blaze

Chief Mike Wood and other members of the East Meadow Fire Department had only been in Orange County for half an hour Thursday morning when they were told the Jennings Creek Wildfire was quickly approaching a nearby house.

The three-story house, which crews called "The Pink House" due to its dark pink base, stood at the bottom of a 500-foot cliff lining the west side of Greenwood Lake in Warwick. When Wood, 45, of East Meadow and his crew arrived, the fire was only about 75 feet away on top of the ridge.

Another crew had spent the past 12 hours trying to push it back but had left, Wood was told, and only four local firefighters were on the scene.

"We showed up with 20 people deep, two vans, an apparatus that had a full tank of water, a tanker right behind me that they supplied us with," Wood said. Wood said his son, Mike Jr., 24, took the nozzle hose and ran up the cliff "like Spiderman" to put the fire out.

Later, he said, "The chief said to me, ‘I thought we were going to lose that house. I could not thank you guys enough.’"

The crew of about 25 firefighters, along with several other Nassau County fire departments, had left at 4:30 a.m. on Thursday, not knowing what to expect other than working a 12-hour shift. After an hour and a half drive, they were at a loss for words at the sight of the fire.

"We parked our engines, and the moment we stopped, we looked right, looked to the left, looked up and down, all you saw was orange," Wood said.

East Meadow is one of the dozens of Long Island fire departments who traveled almost every day to Orange County to assist in the containment of the Jennings Creek Wildfire, which has burned more than 5,000 acres of land since Nov. 8. As of Wednesday, the fire had been largely contained.

Since deployment began Wednesday, at least 18 Suffolk County departments, not including four who have made two treks, have traveled to provide mutual aid to Orange County, said Rudy Sunderman, Suffolk FRES emergency service commissioner.

Nassau fire marshal Michael Uttarro said at least 30 county fire departments have deployed to Orange County since Wednesday. The departments joined many others in the tristate area who worked a rotating 12-hour shift and then returned as needed.

Wood described the first few hours containing the fire near the house as chaotic, as fire was "everywhere."

He recalled: "There was fire to the east side of us, fire to the west side of us, fire north of us, above the house, coming back down."

But with the amount of manpower and with how quickly they were deployed, the team was able to push the fire to the other side of the ridge within an hour. Aside from a part of a fence, the Pink House only received minimal damage.

In the 12 hours East Meadow spent in Orange County, about 40,000 gallons of water were used to push it back to the fire line.

Capt. Bob Corwin, of Greenport Fire Department, along with five other Greenport firefighters and several county departments, met at 3 a.m. in Yaphank on Saturday and arrived in Orange County around 7 a.m.

Corwin, 52, of Greenport, said after a briefing with a few hundred other departments, Suffolk firefighters were tasked with going from the New Jersey state line and back to New York to put out any hot spots still burning after the rest of the ground is scorched.

Peat, which is found underneath the dirt, can burn underground for a period until it finds a spot "to pop back out." Corwin said he and his team used rakes and shovels about 200 feet from houses to dig and turn over rocks.

Since Warwick is in the mountains, he said the environment is a different kind of challenge, as Long Island is relatively flat. "It's very rough terrain," he said.

Like East Meadow, they were supposed to work a 12-hour shift and be released in the evening. But around 5 p.m., flames jumped a fire line, and officials enacted a voluntary evacuation plan affecting about 165 houses in Warwick. Suffolk departments were each assigned to a nearby house to protect until the fire was pushed back behind the line.

Corwin said he and his team protected one house until the predawn hours Sunday. The crew took naps in rotation to retain their energy.

"We’d send two guys back to the truck and get a quick cat nap while the rest can keep an eye on things, and we just kept rotating out that way," he said.

The captain said he was touched by the support of the community. While at the Greenwood Lake firehouse, community members provided meals to Corwin and his team. They also donated items like clothing, socks, and gloves.

"On Sunday, when we were getting ready to pack up, they were actually turning donations away because they had so much stuff," Corwin said.

Both Corwin and Wood said they would return to Orange County again if given the opportunity.

"I couldn't be prouder of or joyful of the team that went out there with me," Wood said. "It wasn't for the pat on the backs or the ‘atta boys’. They had the right gesture in their hearts."