12/03/2025
December 3rd 1999. From Rusty Ricker
The former Worcester Cold Storage and Warehouse Company building was located at 266 Franklin Street about five blocks east of the central business district near Union Station and adjacent to an elevated section of Interstate Route 290. The six-story Type IV heavy timber structure was formerly used as a meat cold storage facility and had been vacant since 1991.
The original building was constructed in 1905, and in 1912 another attached building was constructed on Side Delta. The building constructed in 1905 was designated Building A, and the portion constructed in 1912 was referred to as Building B. The entire building contained six floors above ground, for a total of 94,176 square feet, and a full basement. The exterior walls, constructed of brick, measured 18 inches thick. The interior walls were covered with 6 to 18 inches of asphalt-impregnated cork (depending on the floor level), 4 inches of polystyrene and/or foam glass, and a thin layer of glass board. The flooring was wooden except for the flooring in the basement and first and second floors, which were concrete. The joists consisted of heavy timbers.
Two stairwells were present; one was located on Side Bravo and extended from the basement to the flat roof, and the other was located on Side Charlie and extended to the third floor only. Two sets of freight elevators were present, one on Side Bravo and the other on Side Charlie, and both were adjacent to stairwells. Two loading dock areas existed; one was located on Side Bravo while another was located on Side Charlie. The upper floors of the building had few windows or other openings. Six windows were present on the second-floor level, three on Side Alpha and three on Side Delta of Building B, but they had been covered with plywood. Window openings which were present in the stairwell on Side Bravo were also covered with plywood.
Although the building entrances had been secured by plywood since 1991, homeless people had gained access to the building and established living quarters. Although remnants of a sprinkler system were present in some areas, there was no functioning suppression system working at the time of the fire. There was also no detection system in place.
The fire was started sometime between 1630 and 1745 hours in Building B on the second floor. Therefore, the fire had been in progress for about 30 to 90 minutes before the box alarm was struck. At 1815 hours Central Dispatch advised “all companies striking Box 1438 Franklin and Arctic Streets for 236 Franklin Street.” Engines 1, 6, 12, and 13 responded, along with Ladders 1 and 5, Rescue 1, and Car 3, which included District Chief 3 and his Aide.
Engine 1 was first to arrive on the scene at 1816 hours and reported heavy smoke showing. At 1817 hours, Central Dispatch advised all companies that the correct address was 266 Franklin Street. District Chief 3 arrived on the scene at 1819 hours, assumed Command, and requested a second alarm due to the size of the building.
Second-alarm companies consisted of Engines 2 and 16, Aerial Scope 2, and Car 2, which included District Chief 2 and his Aide. As the second-alarm companies arrived on the scene, they were directed by Command to stage under a nearby interstate overpass.
At 1820 hours, Command radioed Central Dispatch and requested any available building information, but no information was ever found or received. Note: Due to the lack of pre-fire planning and inspection, and lack of building plans or drawings, confusion existed among the firefighters as to the configuration and number of floors contained within the building. Command then entered the building through a doorway from the first floor ground level on Side Alpha and proceeded up the stairs to the second floor, where he conducted interior building operations. Simultaneously, his Aide circled the building to conduct a scene survey, and crews from Engine 13 and Ladder 1 also entered the building. The Aide reported that he was on the Charlie/Delta corner of the building and that he saw heavy fire burning in and up the elevator shafts.
At 1822 hours, Engine 13 also reported fire in the elevator shaft on the second and third floors on the Charlie/Delta corner. Ladder 1, in a freezer room on the second floor, reported they had a room full of fire, and they requested a hoseline be brought in. Command ordered a 2 ½-inch hoseline from Engine 1 and a 2 ½-inch hoseline from Engine 16 be laid to the elevator shaft on the second floor at the Charlie/Delta corner. A 1 3/4-inch hoseline from Engine 1, a 2 ½-inch hoseline from Engine 12, and a 2 ½-inch hoseline from Engine 6 had been laid to the second and third floors through the stairwell on Side Bravo. All the lines were charged except the 2 ½-inch hoseline from Engine 6, and active firefighting began.
At 1826 hours, Command was advised that two homeless people might be in the building. Car 2 arrived on the scene at 1831 hours, assumed Command and was positioned on the outside of the Alpha/Bravo corner of the building. He requested a status report from Car 3, who was now Interior Command and he was told that heavy fire was burning on the second and third floors in Building B and that two homeless people might be in the building.
When Engine 1, Ladder 1, and Rescue 1 arrived on the scene on the first alarm, they all split up into crews. Engine 1’s crew was comprised of a Captain and one firefighter who entered the building looking for fire extension while the other two firefighters from Engine 1 remained at the apparatus to set it up. Ladder 1’s company split into two crews; one crew proceeded to the roof while the other crew checked for fire extension. Rescue 1, which was comprised of a Lieutenant and four firefighters, including Firefighters Jeremiah Lucey and Paul Brotherton split into two, two-man crews while the driver remained with the apparatus. Command instructed the crews from all three companies to search the building for homeless people and fire extension.
The crew from Engine 1 (Captain and firefighter) entered the building from Side Bravo loading dock and joined one of the crews from Rescue 1 who had entered the building from the Side Alpha first floor ground level stairway. The two crews, which included Lucey and Brotherton from Rescue 1, met at the stairwell on the first floor. They all proceeded up the stairwell and observed the other crew from Rescue 1 enter the third floor. Engine 1’s crew and Lucey and Brotherton continued to the roof via the stairwell. Once on the roof, they proceeded to the Charlie/Delta corner where they joined a crew from Ladder 1. Lucey and Brotherton reported to Interior Command that they were on the roof and had heavy smoke and embers showing. The crews cleaned out a skylight measuring 15 square feet which was located over the elevator shaft, and Ladder 1 reported that the skylight was completely vented and that hot embers were coming through. The three crews (Engine 1, Rescue 1, and Ladder 1) left the roof, returned to the stairwell, and descended the stairs.
Engine 1’s crew were in the lead down the stairs, and they returned to the first floor. Ladder 1’s crew descended the stairs after the Engine 1 crew and entered the second floor from the stairwell on Side Bravo. Lucey and Brotherton entered the sixth floor and began a top-down, search-and-rescue sweep and fire extension check. After completing the check of the sixth floor, they entered the fifth floor. Simultaneously, the other crew from Rescue 1 (Lieutenant and one firefighter) left the third floor and went to the fourth floor while Ladder 1’s crew worked the second floor. The search-and-rescue crews were not using search ropes due to the light-to-moderate smoke conditions. Heavy, black, acrid smoke suddenly filled the second floor, causing all crews on the second floor to become disoriented and lose sight of one another. Ladder 1’s crew conducted a right-hand search and eventually found the doorway that opened into the stairwell. They descended the stairwell until they found Interior Command who was now located between the second and third floors in the stairwell.
Interior Command relocated to the bottom of the second-floor stairwell and ordered a head count. It was determined that Lucey and Brotherton from Rescue 1 were missing. The Aide for Interior Command, without wearing a self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA), went to the fourth floor and stayed in the stairwell yelling, to no avail, for the missing firefighters.
At 1834 hours, Command radioed the Lieutenant from Rescue 1, requesting his location and inquiring whether the primary and secondary searches for any civilians were completed. The Lieutenant responded that they had checked the third floor and were advancing up the stairwell to another floor. He reported no fire but heavy smoke. The Lieutenant and firefighter from Rescue 1 proceeded to the fourth floor and were checking a room when visibility dropped to nearly zero. They were running low on air so they left the room, descended the stairs, and returned to an apparatus to change air bottles.
While they were changing air bottles, the driver told them that two firefighters from Rescue 1 were lost. The Lieutenant and firefighter re-entered the building, and believing they were going to the fourth floor, instead went to the third floor because they thought the building had only five floors. Using search ropes, they searched the area on the third floor all the way back to a door opening through the firewall which separated the two buildings but did not encounter the missing Rescue 1 members.
At 1841 hours, Interior Command radioed Central Dispatch to make the following broadcast: “All companies working inside the structure use extreme caution. There may be holes in the floor, and the building may be extremely unsafe.” At 1842 hours, Command requested a third alarm due to heavy fire conditions. Engines 3 and 7 and Ladder 2 respond.
At 1847 and 1848 hours respectively, one of the missing firefighters from Rescue 1 made the following two radio transmissions: “Rescue to Command, I need help on the floor below the top floor of the building. We are lost. Rescue to Command, we need help on the fourth floor.” At 1849 hours, Command had Central Dispatch clear the radio channel for emergency traffic, and another radio transmission was heard from one of the missing firefighters: “We have an emergency, Command. We are two floors down from the roof. This is the rescue company. Come now, two floors down from the roof. Guys, not the top floor, one floor down.” A short time later, radio contact was made with the victims to determine their status. One of them replied, “We need air, we need air. I’m sharing a tank off me right now. We are lost. You got to send a rescue team up here for us. Second floor down from the roof, two floors down. We were on the roof, and then we checked the next floor down. Now we are on the next one. Hurry.”
At 1853 hours, Engine 13 reported that conditions inside the building were deteriorating very quickly. Command requested a fourth alarm and that the Chief of the Department be notified. At 1854 hours, Command radioed Interior Command that a fourth alarm had been struck and asked for verification of the floor the two fire fighters were trapped on. Interior Command responded, “They are on the second floor from the top. Two floors down from the roof, and I have Ladder 2, Engine 3, and Ladder 1 all going looking for them.”
At 1855 and 1856 hours, Interior Command made the following two requests: “Rescue 1, activate your PASS system so we can hear you. Activate your emergency alarm. Activate your PASS emergency alarm.” At 1857 hours, one of the missing firefighters radioed back, “They are activated.”
When Engines 3 and 7 and Ladder 2 arrived on the scene for the third alarm, the engines were staged on the Alpha/Delta corner, and Ladder 2 was staged on Side Alpha of the building. The companies were instructed to proceed to Command at the Alpha/Bravo corner of the building. Ladder 2’s company consisted of a Lieutenant and three firefighters. The driver stayed at the truck while the Lieutenant and two firefighters proceeded to the command post. At the command post they received orders to conduct search-and-rescue operations on the fifth floor. They proceeded to the dock doors on Side Bravo and entered the building. Ladder 2 Lieutenant Thomas Spencer and Firefighter Timothy Jackson were the first up the stairwell while the third firefighter followed. At the third-floor level the trailing firefighter joined a firefighter from Engine 3 who had become separated from his crew. The two firefighters began knocking out the plywood covering the window on the third floor. After knocking out the plywood, they went to the fourth floor and knocked out the plywood in that window. They ascended the stairwell to the fifth floor where they thought they would meet up with Lieutenant Spencer and Firefighter Jackson, but about 10 minutes had passed without seeing them, and they assumed that the Lieutenant and firefighter had entered the room. The low-air alarm sounded on the SCBA worn by the firefighter from Ladder 2, so he and the firefighter from Engine 3 returned to the first floor.
While on the first floor, at 1906 hours, the firefighter from Ladder 2 radioed Lieutenant Spencer and requested his location. The Lieutenant replied, “We came up the stairwell. We are on the fifth floor.” He asked the Lieutenant, “What is your location on the fifth floor?” and the Lieutenant replied, “Good question.” He asked Spencer to repeat the message, and the Lieutenant replied, “We are doing a sweep. I believe we are in the front part of the building.” At 1910 hours, Spencer radioed Command: “Chief, get a company up the stairwell to the fifth floor. We can’t locate the stairwell, or give us some sign as to which way to go. We are running low on air and we want to get out of here.” At 1914 hours, Spencer and Jackson radioed again, requesting the following: “Send someone up to the stairwell to the fifth floor and stand in the doorway and start yelling. We can’t find the door.” The crew from Engine 3 responded, “We have the message and are going to the fifth floor.” Although the crew from Engine 3 located the doorway on the fifth floor at 1919 hours, they did not make contact with Spencer or Jackson.
Engine 3’s company consisted of a Lieutenant and four firefighters, including Firefighter James Lyons and Firefighter Joseph McGuirk. Before leaving the engine, the Lieutenant told the company that they were going to be used for search-and-rescue operations and that they would be entering the building. According to a pre-determined plan, the company split into two crews, one consisting of the Lieutenant and two firefighters, and the other consisting of Lyons and McGuirk. When both crews exited the truck, the Lieutenant took his crew and ran to the command post while the other crew geared up. Note: It is assumed that Lyons and McGuirk entered the building at this point. When the Engine 3 crew arrived at the command post, two other crews were already there: three members from Ladder 2 and three members from Engine 7. Working in crews of three or four, they were instructed to use ropes while looking for the four missing firefighters. The Lieutenant from Engine 3 received instructions to take air bottles up the stairwell and to try to locate Rescue 1 Firefighters Lucey and Brotherton who were supposedly on the fourth floor.
The Lieutenant and two firefighters each grabbed an air bottle and proceeded up the B stairwell to what they thought was the fourth floor. The third firefighter became separated from the crew while going up the stairwell. Once at the third floor, the Lieutenant and one firefighter entered the room and began their search. Visibility was about 1 ½ feet vertically off the floor and about 5 feet horizontally along the floor. While they were searching two rooms which were thought to be freezers about 35 square feet in size, visibility worsened, and they used a right-hand search to locate the door into the stairwell. They went down the stairwell and out onto the loading dock on Side Bravo where they changed air bottles. Once again they went up the B stairwell, this time to the fifth floor, and without making contact with Lucey or Brotherton, came back down to the loading dock.
One of the Engine 3 firefighters accompanied the Aide from Car 2 went up the stairwell to the third and fourth floors. They held their breath to stop the flow of air into the face pieces of their SCBAs so that they could hear better and listened for PASS devices, but they never heard anything. They returned to the loading dock, and the firefighter walked along the outside of Side Alpha. He joined up with a firefighter from Ladder 2 and another firefighter. The three firefighters used a 1 3/4-inch line off an engine in the area to hit the fire through one of the windows on the second floor of Side Alpha. Note: Two other firefighters, Firefighter James Lyons and Firefighter Joseph McGuirk, did not make initial contact with Command nor anyone at the scene, and were not seen entering the building. However, according to the Central Dispatch transcripts, they may have joined Lieutenant Spencer and Firefighter Jackson on the fifth floor.
At 1924 hours, Command called for a head count of all personnel, and it was then determined that six firefighters were missing. At 1929 hours, the Chief of the Department called for a fifth alarm, and Engines 5 and 10 responded. At 1928 and 1929 hours, the missing firefighters from Engine 3 and Ladder 2 were radioed, but no response was ever received from either crew. At 1931 and 1936 hours, the missing firefighters were radioed a second time, and again no response was received. At 1948 hours, Interior Command radioed the missing firefighters a third time but never received a response.
At 1949 hours, the crew from Engine 8, who had responded on the fourth alarm, radioed that they were on the fourth floor and that the structural integrity of the building had been compromised. A thermal imaging unit was brought to the scene by a neighboring fire department and put into service at 1952 hours, but it stopped working at 1955 hours due to the intense heat. At 1952 hours, a member from the Fire Investigations Unit reported to the Chief of the Department that heavy fire (flames of approximately 30 to 40 feet) had just vented through the roof on the C side. At 2000 hours Interior Command ordered everyone out of the building, and a series of short horn blasts were sounded to signal the evacuation. The operation changed from an offensive attack, including search and rescue, to a defensive attack with the use of heavy-stream appliances.
After the fire had been knocked down, search-and-recovery operations commenced until recall of the box alarm at 2227 hours on December 11, 1999 after all the bodies of the missing firefighters were recovered.
Lieutenant Thomas E. Spencer‚ age 42‚ was a 21-year veteran of the Worcester Fire Department. A life-long Worcester resident‚ he was involved in many church and community youth activities‚ including scouting‚ soccer and Little League. His brother was also a member of the department. He survived by his wife Kathy and three children. His son Danny later became a member of the fire department.
Firefighter Timothy Jackson, age 51, was a 27-year veteran of the Worcester Fire Department. A U. S. Army Vietnam veteran‚ Jackson had received many commendations including a Bronze Star‚ an Army Commendation Medal‚ and a Purple Heart. He was posthumously promoted to Lieutenant and is survived by his wife Mary and by his two sons, Timmy Jr. and Noel. He also had two stepchildren, Sean and Diane. He also left a host of grandchildren, many brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews.
Firefighter Paul A. Brotherton, age 41, was a 16-year veteran of the Worcester Fire Department. An Air Force veteran‚ Brotherton worked part-time as a carpenter. He is survived by his wife and six sons, five of which later became members of the fire department.
Firefighter Jeremiah Lucey, age 38, was a 9-year veteran of the Worcester Fire Department. Lucey was a member of the Worcester Fire Department Honor Guard and the Massachusetts Hazardous Waste Material Team. He also worked part-time at the Massachusetts Firefighting Academy. He is survived by his wife, Michelle; two sons, Jeremiah III, age 11, and John, age 8; his parents, Jeremiah and Bridget Lucey; and a sister, Noreen Fabrycki. His son Jeremiah III later became a member of the fire department.
Firefighter James Lyons, age 34, was a 11-year veteran of the Worcester Fire Department. James also was a member of the Massachusetts State police for a few years. He was a proud member of the Worcester Bagpipe Brigade and was posthumously promoted to Lieutenant. He is survived by his parents, James F. and Joan Lyons.
Firefighter Joseph McGuirk, age 38, was a two-year member of the Worcester Fire Department. His extended family has more than 200 years of firefighter service. Prior to joining the department‚ he owned a contracting company. He is survived by his wife, Linda, and their two children, Everett and Emily.
A memorial service and procession for the firefighters were held in Worcester's Centrum Centre on December 9, 1999. The service was broadcast on several national news networks and was attended by President Bill Clinton, Vice President Al Gore, Senator Ted Kennedy and Senator John Kerry. Also in the procession were firefighters from around the United States, Canada, and from Dublin, Ireland. The Boston Stock Exchange suspended business at 11:00 am during the memorial and observed a minute's silence while a bell was rung in tribute on the trading floor.”
