At 10:44 a.m. on Monday, Stations 5, 2, 1, 7, 1014, and EMS Stations 59 were alerted to a reported house fire on Notley Woods Lane in Chaptico. As units responded they were advised that a roofing crew was on scene and reported the basement was on fire. Engine 52 arrived on the scene and laid a 5" supply line from Notley Hall Road. Based on information received while responding the working incident task force was added to the assignment bringing Engine 1010, Engine 93, Squad 3, ALS and EMS Station 29. Engine 52 arrived on the scene and located a single story home on a basement with smoke showing. A 360 of the house confirmed fire in the basement. Engine 52 also requested two Fire Boats to be added to the assignment due to it being directly on the water. Boat 4 and Boat 1014 were dispatched. Engine 52 deployed an attack line to the walk up basement door.
Engine 51 (Chief 5B) was next arriving and finished the hose lay to Engine 52. Chief 5B established the Chaptico Command. Engine 23 was directed to pull an additional attack line from Engine 52 to division one above the fire. Engine 73 laid an additional supply line to a nearby pond and a relay was set up as the water supply. Engine 52's crew made an attack on the basement. After knocking down fire in several rooms of the basement they still encountered high heat and low visibility. Engine 23 reported the same on division one with no active fire. With that information, Command requested the evacuation tones be sounded and all crews exit the structure.
During the evacuation a crew member from Engine 52 became disoriented in the basement and called a Mayday. The Rescue Group lead by Chief 7 and crews from Station 7, began locating additional access points to the basement. The firefighter was able to locate the exit along with a member from Truck 1 to exit the structure. Once it was confirmed all crews were out of the home the mayday was cleared. Trooper 7 self deployed to the scene upon hearing the mayday and landed in a field next to the scene.
Crews repositioned lines and continued to extinguish the fire. During the Mayday a second alarm was sounded alerting several additional units to the scene. Once an accountability was complete and water supply was fully established crews made another interior attack on the fire. Crews continued to operate for another 45 minutes before the fire was declared under control.
Three total firefighters (two from Station 5) were transported to MedStar St. Mary's by EMS units. All firefighters were treated and released within a couple hours. The fire is currently under investigation by the Office of the Maryland State Fire Marshal. We would like to thank all those who reached out to check on the injured firefighters. We would also like to thank Hollywood VFD for providing coverage during the incident at the station.