A resident informed me that they heard an explosion and could see a large fire, I quickly went over to a nearby window with iPhone in hand to take this first photo and attempt to estimate as best I could the response time for fire attendance crew to attend which turned out to be around 10 to 15 mins from first fire smoke sighting by resident. The call out time may have been longer due to resident not actually seeing the fire for some minutes. But this appears a very good estimate.
I noticed that the first fire engine arrived from West Hampstead direction. There are now since the closure of Belsize Fire Station only three Fire Stations in Camden which are Euston Road, Kentish Town and West Hampstead. So clearly this call-out had come from West Hampstead.
A second Fire engine also from West Hampstead direction arrived several minutes later.
The fire was hosed down with white smoke emanating, in total around 20 mins from first sighting of fire / smoke.
Later in the afternoon after the police had cleared the road closure and vacated the area I went to talk to the affected local residents to determine what they thought of the response time from the Fire Services. Naturally, they were all very concerned as to what happened, it appears from what I was told that a gas cylinder feeding a BBQ had exploded for some reason apparently blowing in a large patio window and setting garden hoardings attached to two houses alight. For privacy reasons I did not take any photos of the damage that I witnessed, as I am sure the affected residents would rather that be done by insurance assessors.
It was reported to me that a large explosion quickly followed by heavy smoke engulfed the immediate area. It was estimated from local residents that around 15 mins from hearing the explosion to seeing the police and first fire crew.
The general feeling was that the police and fire crews did a very professional job, the police set up a cordon to prevent immediate access to Elsworthy Rd / Elliott Sq. The whole incident dealt with very quickly. The police removing the cordons about two hours later. when all was considered safe. Thankfully, no one was reported as being injured in this blast, but clearly that was a very close call.
Conclusions
I asked the local people that I had meet how they felt about the response time now that Belsize Fire station has been closed. They all thought that it appeared to be around 15 mins which seemed reasonable. But most were concerned about increased response times had this incident occurred during the week when very heavy traffic are affecting the Euston Road or Finchley Road area, since West Hampstead, Euston Road and Kentish Town Fire Stations in Camden are not exactly very close.
The response time for this incident this Sunday appear in line with what I had been informed at fire briefing post closure of Belsize Fire Station. But and this is the BIG but this was on a early Sunday morning when road traffic was at its absolute quietest. This would have been very different had this fire occurred mid-week around busy traffic times and or had the fire crew been dealing with another fire at the time.
This incident shows that a fire attendance to Belsize on a Sunday morning is around the average guidelines but it also serves to demonstrate that response times are indeed longer than had the response been from Belsize Fire Station 4 streets away.
One must not forget the poor folks today who was affected by this calamity in Belsize this weekend. Lets hope that all damage can be repaired as swiftly as possible.
