MELROSE — Just a few days before the start of the city’s big seasonal celebration known as Home for the Holidays, firefighters battled a house fire Tuesday just behind a section of downtown Melrose.
Crews received word around 10:35 a.m. of a possible fire on the second floor of a home at 12 Stevens Pl., a narrow roadway that cuts from Upham Street behind businesses and meets up with Eastman Place, which empties onto Main Street near Starbucks.
Fire Chief Ed Collina was the first on scene, and confirmed that smoke was coming from the second floor.
Engines 2 and 3, the ladder company, the rescue crew and Fire Captain Chris Dillon, the shift commander, were already en route.
Collina could not have been more impressed with the work of firefighters who dealt with a tough, challenging, confined area.
“The ladder crew did a great job maneuvering the stick (the aerial ladder) around power lines and other wiring. They got up quickly and were one of the keys to this fight.”
Smoke was showing from the back of 12 Stevens Pl. It was soon determined that the residents were out of the two-story residence, so the ladder crew began breaking windows in the front to ventilate the space.
Ground ladders were then used to get Capt. Mike Sullivan’s Engine 3 crew into the building with a 200-foot attack. The Engine 2 crew grabbed a backup line, but because Engine 3’s crew worked so quickly to knock the fire down, the backup was not needed.
“This was quite simply a textbook firefighting operation,” the chief said.
However, there was extensive damage. There was fire damage on the second floor and smoke and water damage on the first floor. At press time, the house was inhabitable.
Damage is estimated around $175,000.
The cause remains under investigation.
While all city crews worked the fire, the city was covered by Stoneham Engine 2, Saugus Engine 1 and Malden Ladder 3.
Melrose fire crews were back in quarters around 1 p.m.
