I'm home now. Outside the house is an old beater Explorer with all my gear from my usual truck thrown inside. Everything I have that I can reasonably run through the washing machine is either in it or staged to go in order to rid myself of the smoke smell. It was a hell of a night.
I'm a tv news photog in DC. I often get assigned to use our 'live' microwave trucks or satellite trucks, and the oldest of these, Unit 5 is my take home truck.
Around 7:15pm I was driving my venerable old friend Unit 5, a 1999 GMC Suburban live truck on Rock Creek Parkway past the Kennedy Center in DC when I began to smell smoke. I turned on the cabin lights to see an alarming amount of smoke filling the cabin. I slammed on the brakes, threw it into park, hit the strobes and bailed out.
As I exited I saw flames behind the driver's seat. I ran around back, pulled a little gear out then went up to the driver's rear door (which accesses the live unit's rack rear) and opened it. Apparently an electrical short had caught my winter parka and raincoat on fire. I pulled them out and with that most of the fuel of the fire was removed. I swatted the burning wires a few times with my left fist and the burning wires went out.
The DCFD arrived and put out my pile of flaming coats fusing themselves to the asphalt. US Park Police did a report then I drove the truck back to the shop. It will be fine, just needs the racks rewired, which will probably take about a week.
After that I was sent out in another truck to go finish the story I had originally been sent on. It occurred to me later that we had narrowly avoided disaster, as there had been talk of shifting me over to another more capable vehicle earlier in the evening. If so the truck would have shorted out in the garage, and may very well have seriously damaged other vehicles or even the station. After all the Suburban sports a 44 gallon perpetually filled fuel tank, and a lot of gear, and it would have become quite involved before anyone noticed or the sprinklers kicked in.
So now I'm home, coughing a bit from the smoke and generally feeling crappy. Probably shut down soon and try to get some rest. I hope tomorrow is a quieter day.
I'm a tv news photog in DC. I often get assigned to use our 'live' microwave trucks or satellite trucks, and the oldest of these, Unit 5 is my take home truck.
Around 7:15pm I was driving my venerable old friend Unit 5, a 1999 GMC Suburban live truck on Rock Creek Parkway past the Kennedy Center in DC when I began to smell smoke. I turned on the cabin lights to see an alarming amount of smoke filling the cabin. I slammed on the brakes, threw it into park, hit the strobes and bailed out.
As I exited I saw flames behind the driver's seat. I ran around back, pulled a little gear out then went up to the driver's rear door (which accesses the live unit's rack rear) and opened it. Apparently an electrical short had caught my winter parka and raincoat on fire. I pulled them out and with that most of the fuel of the fire was removed. I swatted the burning wires a few times with my left fist and the burning wires went out.
The DCFD arrived and put out my pile of flaming coats fusing themselves to the asphalt. US Park Police did a report then I drove the truck back to the shop. It will be fine, just needs the racks rewired, which will probably take about a week.
After that I was sent out in another truck to go finish the story I had originally been sent on. It occurred to me later that we had narrowly avoided disaster, as there had been talk of shifting me over to another more capable vehicle earlier in the evening. If so the truck would have shorted out in the garage, and may very well have seriously damaged other vehicles or even the station. After all the Suburban sports a 44 gallon perpetually filled fuel tank, and a lot of gear, and it would have become quite involved before anyone noticed or the sprinklers kicked in.
So now I'm home, coughing a bit from the smoke and generally feeling crappy. Probably shut down soon and try to get some rest. I hope tomorrow is a quieter day.
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