BALTIMORE UNDER SEIGE April 27-28, 2015

[BCFDphotoman]

Starting on April 27th at around 3:00 PM Baltimore would be hit with civil unrest that would last until daybreak the following day. It started near the quarters of Engine 52 and spread to the surrounding areas with confrontations with the police. Several Police were beaten badly with 2 were taken unconscious to the hospital. Engine 52 had to leave their house and relocate. It started with taunting Police, fighting and then rocks, bricks and everything else were being thrown. Medics and Suppression units were instructed to stage outside the troubled scene and be escorted into the scene. It later escalated  when 2 MTA Police vehicles were set ablaze and gangs of youths began breaking into a CVS store looting it and later setting it on fire. After the sun went down it went down hill from there. About 20 significant fires were set around the City in buildings. Many vehicles were set on fire everywhere. Companies bypassed these unless there were any exposure problems. The last time Baltimore witnessed something like this was in 1968 when Martin Luther King was assassinated.

 

Here is a shot of the first major blaze.It happened about 8:45 PM. It turned out to be 3 alarms. A warehouse and several other buildings. I grabbed a shot as we pulled up, then had to go to work on it. We didn't clear until 2:30 AM and missed several other fires around. Some companies went from fire to fire through the whole night. There were plenty of mutual aid units from all of the surrounding jurisdictions. They all got there fair share of action.