WTFX
Reprinted with Permission

PHILADELPHIA - A number of city firefighters spent Saturday training to battle fires in a Center City high-rise building, which comes just days after firefighter Michael McGuire was critically injured on the job on the eighth floor of a building.


McGuire’s condition has been upgraded to serious, according to officials, but he still needs to heal from the wounds he suffered battling a fire an extension cord ignited in the Norman Blumberg Apartments on Jefferson Street earlier in the week.

Saturday’s drill had been designed to simulate conditions similar to what the firefighters inside the Norman Blumberg Apartments may have experienced. Dense smoke and poor visibility are barriers firefighters may need to overcome to rescue trapped occupants inside a high-rise building during a fire.

Experts say tall buildings can act like chimneys, and fast-moving smoke can pose a danger to people in a building well before the flames reach their floors.