Inspected Fireplug Useless In Blaze

County workers remove the failed hydrant Wednesday. A detailed inspection determined that a lack of lubricant caused the mechanism to seize.

JULIE BUSCH / Tribune photo

By KEITH MORELLI The Tampa Tribune

Published: Aug 9, 2007

NORTHDALE - A hydrant that failed during a house fire Tuesday sparked a sweeping inspection effort by Hillsborough County Water Services, which will send crews to check more than 100 hydrants across the county.

The announcement was cold comfort for Carlos Licea, who stood in front of the ruins of his home Wednesday morning, sorting through family photographs charred on the borders and baked together.

"I was shocked when I found out about it," he said Wednesday morning, speaking of the broken hydrant. "All these houses are in the same situation. They need to get their act together."

Down the street, a county crew had started to do just that by replacing the fireplug that didn't offer up a drop of water Tuesday afternoon when firefighters tried to tap the line. They wanted more water to fight the lightning-sparked fire at Licea's home, 16216 Bonneville Drive. They had to resort to another hydrant a football field away.

Fire officials said it wouldn't have made any difference. When firefighters got there, the four-bedroom, 2,633-square-foot house that was home to the Licea family for about a month was engulfed in flames.

County crews replaced the failed hydrant Wednesday, water services spokeswoman Pam Greene said.

The hydrant was brought into the shop, where it underwent a detailed inspection. Technicians determined that a lack of lubricant caused the mechanism to seize, Greene said.

It Was A Mueller Centurion, Circa 1976

The hydrant was manufactured in 1976 by Mueller Water Products, she said. The dry-barrel Centurion model has a projected lifespan of 50 years. Mueller was owned in 2005 and '06 by Tampa-based Walter Industries.

The dry-barrel model is not made anymore, she said, not because of problems, but because more efficient hydrant technology has developed.

County crews will find and inspect every Mueller Centurion built in the mid-1970s, about 106 out of 12,000 hydrants in the county, she said. Replacing a hydrant costs about $2,000, she said, half for the hydrant, half for labor.

"We will be checking them all to make sure there are no other problems out there," Greene said.

The county has a contract with Cropland Services, which was paid $185,000 almost two years ago to inspect the hydrants in unincorporated Hillsborough County. The contract expires Oct. 1, and a new contractor will perform the service the next two years.

Greene said there were no problems with Cropland; the new contractor just submitted a lower bid.

The county randomly inspects hydrants after Cropland's inspections, she said, to make sure the contractor is doing its job, and over the past two years, there have been no issues. The hydrant on Bonneville Drive was last inspected on June 21, she said, and it passed inspection.

In light of that faulty hydrant, the county will review more closely the work done by Cropland, Greene said.

"We're going to be looking into their service record," she said, "and diagnose that record."

The contract, she said, called for Cropland to examine every hydrant in the county once a year.

Attempts on Wednesday to reach the Lakeland-based Cropland Services office were unsuccessful.

Bad Hydrant, No Difference

Firefighters arrived at the Licea home about 3:15 p.m. to find the building engulfed in flames, said fire-rescue spokesman Ray Yeakley.

After they failed to get water from the hydrant, other firefighters managed to connect a hose to a hydrant about 300 feet away and water was pumped from there to the fire.

The delay in getting hydrant water on the fire did not matter, Yeakley said, as firefighters in tanker trucks were immediately pumping water onto the flames.

"It was too involved at that point," he said. "It made no difference whatsoever."

The fire was caused by a lightning strike from a storm that moved through northwest Hillsborough County on Tuesday afternoon. Lightning from the same storm also sparked a second house fire in the Westchase area, but that fire was put out and caused little damage, Yeakley said.

Licea, his mother, Olivia, and two sons, Alex, 9, and Christian, 7, were home at the time, waiting for the storm to pass so they could go to a nearby pool.

They listened as the thunder got closer and closer, he said.

"Then, a huge, strong one hit the house," he said. "It was like a crack."

He said he felt it in his fingers as he typed on a computer. His younger son told him it hit the house, even though the television set remained on. The phones, however, were dead.

Licea went to the laundry room, where he smelled wires burning, and then to the garage, where he smelled wood burning. He opened the attic hatch to find smoke and flames. Everyone got out of the house safely, he said, taking only the clothes on their backs into the pouring rain.

Lost were all of the identification, credit cards, passports and everything the family had, he said. He was trying Wednesday to think of all of the tasks he had to do, while still wondering where he was going to live.

The main job Wednesday was salvaging personal items, mainly photographs. "We didn't think we would find so much," he said, glancing down at the charred, acrid photo albums. He was relieved that the family Bible and a crucifix hanging on his mother's bedroom wall were salvaged undamaged.

About 36 firefighters focused on protecting the adjacent homes, which were about 15 to 20 feet on either side of the burning building, Yeakley said. The fire's heat melted the window blinds in one neighboring home without breaking the glass.

The fire caused about $300,000 damage to the single-story, concrete block home and destroyed about $75,000 worth of contents, he said.

Reporter Keith Morelli can be reached at (813) 865-1504 or kmorelli

@tampatrib.com.