January 17, 2024-Updated
TRENTON, NJ (MERCER)–City firefighters braved frigid weather to battle a three-alarm blaze that destroyed four vacant rowhouses and damaged two other occupied attached buildings Wednesday evening (Jan. 17, 2024).
It was just after 8:35 p.m. Wednesday when multiple calls flooded the city’s 911 communications center reporting a fire in the area of Dye and South Broad streets. Additional calls, alternately reporting anywhere from one to three houses on fire, gave the location as Dye and Genesee streets. Due to the volume of 911 calls being received, a full first alarm was transmitted, sending Engines 3, 7, 10 and 6, Ladders 2 and 4, Rescue 1, Special Services 1, and both on-duty battalion chiefs were dispatched.
Firefighters quickly arrived to find heavy fire and smoke showing from the upper floors of the row of four vacant structures stretching from 115 to 121 Dye Street. Multiple hoselines were immediately put in service. Burning overhead power lines briefly hampered firefighting operations.
A second alarm was sounded at 8:45 p.m., sending Engine 9 to the scene. The third alarm was struck a little before 9:10 p.m., bringing in all remaining on-duty city fire companies (Engines 1 and 8 and Ladder 1) to the scene. At the height of the fire, the incident commander reported that firefighters had nine hoselines stretched and one aerial master stream flowing water on the flames from overhead. Police cordoned off several area streets as large diameter hoselines were laid from several different fire hydrants to supply all the water needed.
The extreme cold weather – about 10 degrees Fahrenheit with the wind chill factored in – caused water running off from hoselines, hydrants and fire apparatus to create icy conditions. Multiple crews from Trenton Emergency Medical Service were on scene in case anyone was hurt. While some firefighters were seen to slip on the ice, there were no immediate reports of any injuries.
Mutual aid firefighters from Hamilton, Lawrence and Ewing townships responded to man empty Trenton firehouses and provide coverage to the city. Those mutual aid cover companies responded to several other emergencies throughout the evening, including an accident in which a vehicle flipped over on Route 29 near Calhoun Street. Hamilton Fire Department’s Truck 10-1 was also called as a precaution to standby at the Roebling Market, a block from the fire scene on Dye Street, after one of the city’s ladder truck developed a mechanical fault.
Signal 22, the city’s volunteer fire and police canteen unit, was on scene serving hot chocolate and coffee to firefighters and police officers.
The blaze was officially declared under control at 10:24 p.m. In addition to the four rowhouses ravaged by the flames, the occupied home at 123 Dye Street was damaged by smoke and fire, while the upper floors of the last attached property in the row – an apartment at 125 Dye Street, located above a first-floor restaurant at the corner of Dye Street and South Clinton Avenue – reportedly sustained smoke damage.
Wednesday’s blaze occurred just a stone’s throw from where a large commercial building at the corner of Dye and South Broad streets was destroyed by another three-alarm blaze on Oct. 13, 2021.
Investigators from the Trenton Fire Department, city police, the Mercer County Prosecutor’s Office and other agencies were on scene.
