Commissioners cheer Solomons fire efforts

Volunteers, tugboat crews get plaudits

Friday, April 21, 2006

Click here to enlarge this photo File photo A tugboat helps fight the March 15 fire in Solomons. E-Mail This Article | Print This Story

One month after a fire raged through Solomons Island causing $5 million in damage to the Lighthouse Inn, Bowen’s Inn and three nearby condominiums, Fischer added his praises to the volunteer firefighters and tug boat crews who fought the devastating blaze, which was fanned by 45 mph wind gusts.

‘‘Thank you so much. I am indebted,” Fischer said Tuesday, April 18, when the Calvert County Board of County Commissioners officially recognized the crews who fought the fire. In addition to fire crews from Calvert, Charles, St. Mary’s and Anne Arundel counties, 70 fire fighters in total, two tugboats from Chesapeake Energy Services also fought the blaze. The tugs, which normally escort natural gas tankers to the Cove Point natural gas import pier, turned their powerful water cannons on the blaze, pouring a combined 22,000 gallons of water per minute on the burning buildings.

‘‘I don’t think there was a resource that wasn’t represented,” said Joey Leonarrda, fire chief at the Solomons department, who called the assistance from the tugs ‘‘tremendous.”

‘‘It’s the volunteers [at the fire companies] that go every day [but] we’re happy to assist when we can. We hope we don’t have to do it again,” said Tony Codega, captain of the AJ McAllister, one of the tugs

Navigating through smoke and shallow waters with ‘‘zero visibility,” Codega said the tugs crept to within 20 feet of the piers behind the inns before turning their cannons on the fire.

‘‘When we saw the dark smoke turn to steam we knew we were doing better,” he said.

Despite the loss of a pair of iconic Solomons restaurants, Commissioner Jerry Clark (R) predicted the town would bounce back.

‘‘It always comes back,” he said. ‘‘What comes back in its place always makes Solomons better and stronger.”

For now, the displaced are trying to pick up their pieces of their lives and start plans to rebuild.

‘‘What a terrible thing it must have been to stand there and watch everything you had worked for literally go up in smoke,” Commissioner Linda Kelley (R) said.

A month after the fire, Fischer said he plans to rebuild, but more importantly his dozens of employees have all found new jobs.

‘‘We’ll do whatever we can as the Lighthouse family,” he said.

E-mail Andrew Childers at achilders@somdnews.com.