Syracuse, NY-On Monday, January 15, 2024, at 1:32 p.m., Syracuse Firefighters were alerted by the Onondaga County 911 Center to a report of a possible structure fire at 403 Bear Street, on the City’s North Side. Firefighters from Station 2, on Lodi Street, arrived on the scene moments later to find a two-and-a-half story home with smoke and fire showing on the side of the building. A signal ‘99’ was transmitted.
The first arriving companies connected to a nearby fire hydrant and began to stretch a hose into the structure. Additional arriving units assisted in moving hoses, placed additional hoselines, and began a systematic search of the structure, looking for any potentially trapped victims. Crews located the fire in a first-floor apartment and went to work extinguishing the flames. All searches were negative. Thanks to an aggressive interior fire attack, firefighters were able to keep the flames from spreading from the room of origin, limiting the damage.
The apartment where the fire occurred was one of four in the building. It was unoccupied at the time of the fire. Occupants of the other three apartments were able to safely escape, they were being assisted by the Red Cross as needed. The fire apartment suffered fire, smoke, and water damage. The rest of the structure sustained some smoke damage as well. Syracuse Fire Investigators were on the scene working to determine the exact cause and origin of the fire. That investigation is ongoing. The fire was declared out after approximately 20 minutes. There were no injuries reported to civilians, or to fire department personnel.
A total of 39 Fire Department personnel responded to this incident, including command and support staff. Syracuse Fire Department Ambulance, Syracuse Police, American Medical Response, National Grid, and the American Red Cross also responded to the scene.
