[Vision2020] Pullman Fires Update -- Daily News article

[J Ford]

This is so like what has been happening in Yakima - last weekend, they had 7 or 8 fires set, all like these.  Wonder if we have an arsonist traveling the highway?  Be nice if Pullman and Yakima police got together and compared notes - just to make sure they are/not dealing with the same creep.  Anyone know who the victim in Harborview may be?

J  :]


From: areaman at moscow.com
To: Vision2020 at moscow.com
Date: Thu, 15 Nov 2007 12:48:49 -0800
Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Pullman Fires Update -- Daily News article




Message






Thankfully, no loss of 
life:
--------------------------------------
Arson suspected in string of 
Pullman fires
Blazes destroy nine-unit apartment complex, 
duplex, detached garage and several vehicles 
By Hillary Hamm, Daily News staff 
writer
Thursday, November 15, 2007 - Page Updated at 12:00:00 
AM
Police and fire officials say 
arson is suspected in five fires that occurred early this morning in 
Pullman.
"These are all suspicious, and I 
would consider them all related," said Mike Heston, operations officer with the 
Pullman Fire Department.



Fire crews first responded at 4:31 
a.m. to a fire in the 500 block of Southeast Jackson Street, where a detached 
garage was engulfed in flames. The garage and the two cars that were inside it 
are considered a total loss, Fire Chief Pat Wilkins said.
While on Jackson Street, crews 
responded to another garage fire, which was contained to a cabinet and did 
little damage, Wilkins said. 
At 5:13 a.m., crews were called to 
an apartment fire at 129 NW True St. The nine-unit complex was fully engulfed 
when firefighters arrived, Heston said. Crews from Whitman County Rural Fire 
District 12, Colfax and Moscow arrived to help fight the fires. Pullman police 
officers provided security while firefighters doused the flames, which spread to 
a neighboring duplex at 133 NW True St., and ignited several 
vehicles.
A resident in the nine-unit 
complex was trapped inside the burning structure and "ran and bailed out" of a 
top-floor window, Heston said. The man landed on top of a 15-foot retaining 
wall. He suffered a singed airway due to the hot gasses and was covered in cuts 
from the glass. The man was in stable condition and airlifted to Harborview 
Medical Center in Seattle for treatment, Wilkins said.
While at the True Street fires, 
crews were called to a fire on Mackenzie Street where a vehicle - located in a 
parking lot behind Pullman Honda - was engulfed in flames.Pullman Police Cmdr. 
Chris Tennant said he has received a report of a white male with brown hair 
wearing a red jacket "looking suspicious" in the area around the time of the 
vehicle fire. 
"It's a pretty (vague) 
description," he said. 
As of 9 a.m. today, crews were 
working to clean up the scenes and awaiting the arrival of investigators from 
the Washington Region 8 Arson Task Force who will help determine the cause of 
the fires. Heston said that since no evidence - such as gas cans - have been 
found at the fire scenes, he was reluctant to call the fires 
arson-caused.
"I'll let the investigators 
determine that," he said. 
Heston said his crews also are 
prepared to fight more fires today, if necessary. The Pullman Fire Department 
has investigated arson in the past, but "nothing to this magnitude," he 
said.

Hillary Hamm can be reached at (509) 334-6397 ext. 307, 
or by e-mail at hhamm at dnews.com

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