Du Quoin Fire Department ramped up readiness even before Carterville fire

As Ameren and Frontier linemen walked South Division Street in downtown Carterville Tuesday with the thought of moving power and phone lines for safety's sake, the Du Quoin Fire Department has already been ramping up training and safety survey work in downtown Du Quoin.

The goal is to prevent the unthinkable, a major downtown fire that hasn't happened in Du Quoin since the mid 1980s when the Eagles Lodge building burned. What was a three-story building before the fire is now a two-story building decades after that fire.

There have been at least two lesser downtown fires since then.

"We are working on this right now," Fire Chief Bob Shaw told the Du Quoin City Council Monday night. "We are planning life safety inspections. We have gotten firefighter David Durkota trained. In fact, the training took 80 hours at the Illinois Fire Service Institute.

"I am mandated by the Illinois fire marshal to enforce at least the year 2000 Illinois fire code," he said. There were subsequent revisions in 2009 and 2012. We want to bring everyone up to code. I may not even be here by the time the work is finished."

He said the code covers "anything that is a threat to life and safety." He adds, "There are some things that, by law, we can't even leave (once we identify them) until they are fixed." He said that in the coming weeks and months Du Quoin firemen will look at "how people are not taking care of things."

It won't be an in-your-face approach to enforcement. Instead, firemen will identify, survey and report on dilapidated buildings and safety issues. They will partner with owners to educate them about fire dangers. "The worst thing is a town that has two buildings where the businesses are making money with a bad building between."

Then, he thought about it some more. The very worst is somebody who bought a building cheap, threw up some sheetrock on a wall, (did their own wiring), called them apartments and starting collecting rent. That's not the norm. But, it is the fire waiting to happen.

The Carterville fire that destroyed two buildings was caused by an electrical problem. At the outset, a water main leading to a fire hydrant broke. "They broke a five-inch water main. It is unfortunate they had a bad hydrant on a bad line" said Shaw. Water was fed to two aerial ladder trucks from other trucks and portable tankers. "They did a great job of doing that."

Shaw said, "We don't want to spring something on people. We want to help." Du Quoin currently holds a fragile Insurance Service Office of "4." That's a for-profit institute that sells its findings to insurance companies. A "1" rating is the best. "10" is the worst. Shaw said Du Quoin faces a new ISO review in three or four years and with the current training, new downtown water lines and hydrants and a new fire truck on the way the city "will be a solid 4."

"We need to be safe and tenable."