3 Firefighters and a civilian were injured this morning in Willowbrook (Illinois) when a fire company responding to a call was struck by two other vehicles. The ladder truck was responding to a medical run around 0800 when it was hit by two cars as it was turning right into a parking lot. Several vehicles were yielding to the truck and an ambulance behind it, when a woman went around the stopped vehicles from behind and struck the fire truck near its front end. A second female driver then panicked and somehow hit the side of the truck. The ambulance was able to respond to the initial call and an EMS box alarm was initiated for the crash involving the fire truck. Three firefighters and the driver of the second car were taken to the hospital. The firefighters, who were all wearing seat belt. Cops said several citations were issued, including at least one for failure to yield to an emergency vehicle.

FIREFIGHTERS STRUCK UPDATES:
Today's earlier North Carolina Crash:
http://www.wxii12.com/news/18256522/detail.html?treets=gws&tid=...

High Point FF struck and injured last month:
http://firenews.net/index.php/headlines/headlines_article/1118/

VERY TOUGH WEEK FOR THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION of HOMEBUILDERS...
....Lost Support for a Lame Idea and a Genuinely Terrible Loss of Jobs.

The International Code Council's Appeals Board unanimously found no wrong doing in the Sept. 21 vote on IRC Proposal RB64-07/08 mandating fire sprinklers in new SFD's at today's meeting. The board's decision will be voted on by the BOD at a meeting next week in Las Vegas. The denial of the appeal is expected to be supported by ICC's Board of Directors...which means the IRC will require the installation of fire sprinklers in single family homes beginning Jan. 1, 2011. The IRC is the model code for residential building in 46 states including Washington, D.C..

As you know, the "not very happy" National Association of Homebuilders filed their appeal on Oct. 30, whining that the ICC failed to provide a balance of interest in voting. The letter of appeal stated the ICC did not "prevent a single interest group, specifically the fire service, from unfairly dominating the voting at the final action hearings." One interesting argument by the NAHB during the hearing was that they felt that the volunteer fire service shouldn't have been allowed to vote. Silly homebuilders. How'd that work out?

MORE BAD NEWS:
And in other bad and genuinely unfortunate news, not unlike many, many other associations, governments and businesses, the NAHB is making major staffing and budget cutbacks to attempt to survive on one of the worst housing downturns in United States history...the NAHB is cutting $11.5 million from its operating budget. To balance NAHB's budget, they will be eliminating 52 jobs...half of those aren't filled currently. The layoffs took place this week. In addition, they are also heavily reducing expenditures previously approved for 2009.

While we absolutely wish no ill to anyone affected by this tough economy, perhaps the NAHB should (or should have) reconsider the value and high cost in their predictably losing battle against the fire service, public safety and residential fire sprinklers. Hind sight is always 20/20...but if they had used some available (and offered) hind-sight on the history of residential fires and deaths, they could have fully understood that the answer is residential sprinklers to protect the beautiful homes NAHB members build-and those in them.

Per Secret List