SOUTHWICK – On Thursday afternoon around 1 p.m. the Southwick Fire Department received a report of a truck fire in the driveway of the Valvoline Express Care on College Highway.
Southwick firefighters are seen extinguishing the truck fire on Thursday afternoon. (Photo from Russ Anderson)
According to Southwick Fire Chief Russ Anderson, a fire occurred in the back-end storage section of a residential trash truck. When pulling off College Hwy into the business the driver, and sole occupant, saw that the vehicle was catching fire.
While fire personnel are unsure of the exact cause of the fire, there seemed to be an electrical issue that made it difficult for firefighters to go into the storage section and extinguish the fire.
“Due to the electrical failure, we were unable to release the gates to dump the trash,” said Anderson.
Anderson added that firefighters had to manually cut their way into the truck to extinguish the fire while the Southwick DPW (Department of Public Works) removed the debris from the truck. Anderson also noted that it took Southwick Fire and mutual aid almost three hours to fully extinguish the fire.
Although an electrical issue could have been the cause, it is possible that the refuse in the trash hold area of the truck may have contained something flammable. Despite that, Anderson said that the cause of the fire will remain undetermined.
The driver of the trash truck was able to escape the vehicle and suffered no injuries.
