“When I was driving a command vehicle, a vehicle pulled in front of me at the last minute and we went into a skid,” Asst. Fire Chief Fritz Niggeler, said. “It scared the driver. The outcome could have been really bad, but fortunately it wasn’t a collision but it really was a near miss.”

He says two simple words – keep right – could have prevented that near miss. Still, it’s not always a close call. Every year, first responders die in accidents.

The Midland Fire Department hopes the “Keep Right” stickers will help folks remember the rules of the road. “It seems to be helping so far,” Driver Paramedic, Preston Wright, said. “People recognize a little more and pull to the right a little more instead of stopping where they are or pulling to the left.”

As someone always behind the wheel of an ambulance or fire engine, he knows it’s not always easy to get to an emergency safely.

“It gets a little frustrating sometimes,” Wright said. “You know you have the days where it seems like you have to go around everybody and fight your way through traffic.”

He thinks the “Keep Right” program can fix the problem if Midlanders want it to. Drivers have to do their part by paying attention to what’s going around them, by checking their rear and side view mirrors and really that’s the only way this program will work.

Following the message can do more than prevent a deadly crash.

“When we have to slow down our response, that’s time wasted,” Niggeler said. “It could be the difference between life and death. You know in a 911 emergency that’s typically the case that the prompt response is really needed.”

Soon, all of the department’s vehicles will sport the reminders. Then they hope the message will stick.

The homeowner told firefighters that he was headed outside to take a walk when he smelled smoke and went back inside his home. The fire was coming from a closet, he said. Everyone in the home, including two young children, escaped the house without injury, authorities confirmed.

Fire crews first on the scene were able to contain the fire to the northeast bedroom of the house, but Battalion Chief Chad Clark said there was heavy smoke damage throughout the rest of the home and that the family would not be able to stay there overnight.

None of the homes nearby were evacuated, though, many neighbors came out and stood on the sidewalk to watch as dark heavy smoke filled the street and firefighters mopped up hot spots in the home.

Investigators were called out at press time and were on the scene trying to determine the cause of the fire.

Fire investigator Karla Steppe said the fire started in the vicinity of a window-mounted air conditioner in the bedroom where an infant was sleeping. The cause of the fire was accidental, she said, and may have been caused by an overloaded circuit, a short or an electrical problem in the air conditioner itself.

The Red Cross was called to assist the family, which had no insurance, she said. “I can’t stress enough the importance of having insurance,” Steppe said.

Irma Flores, her three children, three grandchildren and more children she is in the process of adopting all were home at the time of the blaze. Everyone got out of the house without injury.

Long said the fire was dispatched at 12:43 p.m., with units arriving three minutes later. He said heavy smoke was visible as soon as they drove up. Because of additions to the house, it was difficult to reach the fire. Firefighters had to go though a window.

Although the fire was confined mainly to one room, Long said, the house was likely to have extensive smoke damage. At least six units from the fire department responded, as well as about 20 fire fighters.

Folger and his wife Mary Catherine Folger, 73, were among five people killed just after midnight Sunday when their plane crashed shortly after takeoff in Brewster County.
Rhode said the Folgers were heavily involved with St. Ann’s Catholic Church in Midland and were supporters of numerous projects.

“I’m just devastated by his death, and I’m still not bringing myself to believe it,” Rhode said of Richard Folger.

The crash occurred early Sunday morning as Mary Folger was being transported back to Midland International Airport via air ambulance. She was being taken to a hospital in Odessa after a “pretty serious fall” caused her to dislocate a hip she recently had replaced, her son, Anthony Folger, said.

The couple was spending time at their second home in Alpine, Anthony Folger said.

Meanwhile, the operator of the air ambulance service has voluntarily grounded operations in the wake of the plane crash that killed five people, an employee with the company said.

Air Ambulance Stat, the medical wing of Amarillo-based O’Hara Flying Service, has temporarily halted service after the crash of one of its twin-engine Cessna 421 planes about a mile east of Alpine-Casparis Municipal Airport, a flight medic with the company, who asked that her name be withheld, said Monday.

The woman described Sharon Falkner, 49, of Fort Davis, as a mentor.

“She was like the mother of us all,” the woman said. “She was in EMS longer than any of us have ever been in it.”

The medic said that Falkner never complained or took a sick day during her time with the company.

“She always had a smile on her face,” she said of Falkner. “This job isn’t something you do for money. This job is something you do because you have a calling.”

The medic said she would be ready to return to the skies when the time comes.

“When we go back up, I will be back in the plane,” she said. “It’s my job. I know the risks. I always knew the risks.”

The National Transportation Safety Board had investigators on site and had at lest one agent from its transportation disaster assistance office, which provides assistance to those affected by plane crashes, in Alpine. Efforts to reach NTSB investigator Jennifer Rodi were unsuccessful.

According to Texas Department of Public Safety reports, the plane was attempting to make an emergency landing, when it hit a rut in a muddy field, overturned and burned.

Medic Tracy Chambers, 42, of Alpine died in the crash, along with pilot Ted Caffarel, 59, of Beaumont also died in the crash.

The medic said Chambers was new to the company. She said she could not discuss details of the plane crash.

Brewster County Sheriff Ronny Dodson said a rut in a field wasn’t to blame. Dodson said that shortly after take-off, the plane had begun to land on a small hill northeast of the airport, breaking off its landing gear before going off the other side of the slope. Dodson said it landed on some “grape-fruit-sized rocks” and there were several explosions.

“When the deputy got there, it was still on fire and upside down,” said Dodson, who said the heat from the explosions kept the deputy from being able to get any closer.

Dodson, who said he lives right next to the airport, said there have been more air transfers from Big Bend Regional Medical Center to Midland and Odessa recently, although he wasn’t sure why.

This is the second fatal air ambulance crash involving transportation of patients between Big Bend Regional Medical Center in Alpine and Odessa-Midland in 2004, four people were killed when Medical Center Hospital’s CareStar, a Bell 407 helicopter, crashed in a field near Pyote in Ward County.

The last fatal air accident at the Alpine airport occurred in 1997 when the single-engine plane of George Merriman III, owner of Skies of Texas Air Charter in Alpine, crashed about a quarter mile from the airport while performing acrobatic maneuvers.

Anthony Folger said he didn’t know anything about the safety of the plane involved in Sunday’s crash.

“It’s obviously very premature to comment on that,” he said. “Right now, our thoughts are only on our parents.”

Citing the more than $300,000 gap remaining in the city’s budget shortfall, council members asked where the funding is coming from for truck and whether funding it will cut funding for anything else out of the budget. Funding for the truck will likely come out of the city’s general fund, which funds the fire department. However, it will not come out of the portion of the general fund designated for the fire department’s operating fund, meaning it will come from another part of the general fund.

Finance Director Michael Dane said money is available in the budget to purchase the truck and that it could be used for another project, but the need is there.

“If we didn’t spend money on this fire truck, we would no doubt be advocating its use for streets,” or some other project, Dane said.

City Manager Harold Dominguez agreed.

“It will (affect) something,” Dominguez said. But, “This is serious enough for us that we feel we have to move it up and move it up today. Here’s the pool of money that will pay for it, now we have to go in and minimize to the best of our ability the impact it will have on other capital projects.”

Paul Alexander and Kendall Hirschfeld pointed out the insurance savings that will be generated from having a newer truck.

“I think we owe this to our firefighters…,” Hirschfeld said.

San Miguel El Alto and Big Spring are sisters and became family under the leadership of then-Mayor Russ McEwen.

With the help of translator Bobby Arizmendi, Correjo explains why he is visiting.

“The purpose of the visit is to continue the ties, continue on with the interchange of culture mainly and see how Big Spring runs and interchange with how we do things in San Miguel and help each other out in continuing the exchange and the benefit through to both cities.”

He explains how an arson dog is trained and works.

“It works off of imprinting the animal to react a certain way to certain chemicals. These dogs detect hydrocarbons, flammable liquids, and there’s no telling exactly how many they’ll indicate on because she detects one particular molecule.”

Big Spring applied for a grant from a grant program set up in Maine in the mid-90s. They got it and acquired Sadie in 1996. She retired in 2003, and Alli was “hired” in 2004.

Today, Condray set up a training course inside one house that was destroyed by one of the arson fires in August 2009. He sprinkled several parts of the house with drops of gasoline and then let Alli go to work.

I had a chance to watch both in action. She found every spot that he set up with the liquid and received a treat for her good work. Condray explains what exactly I saw.

“Alli was indicating on a hydrocarbon compound. It’s prepared at our local Alon Refinery. It’s based off of gasoline. It has the same signature as gasoline or kerosene that’s been burned. So when she detects this, it’s the same thing as if she goes into an actual house fire and has detected a flammable liquid that’s been burnt.

Condray concludes by talking about how important her work is, especially during last year’s arson outbreak.

“She’s a detector. She goes in and helps us find flammable liquid residues in the house. We can work a house like this in about 15 minutes whereas as an investigator it would take me hours and hours to pull my samples.”

She is ready for action.

Martin County Sheriff’s Office Chief Deputy Ernest Wakefield says both sparked up within minutes of each other. He confirmed both were out by 9:15 Monday night.

A third tank battery fire started in Howard County just before 8 on FM 846 west of Knott. Smoke could be seen all the way from Big Spring from the billowing fire.

As of 9:15 Monday night, Howard County Volunteer Fire Fighters were working on putting that fire out.

A bolt of lightning struck a power pole right in back of the CBS 7 Big Spring offices, though that pole did not catch on fire.

What I saw as the storms moved in:
As the storms rolled into Big Spring from Stanton, I saw something I have never seen in 10 years of storm chasing, clouds from every direction moving every which way. Storms firing up along the southbound outflow boundary collided with severe storms moving northeast out of Stanton. Those storms ran into each other and formed new, more powerful storms.

The best way to describe what I saw would be a round-about you would see in Europe. I was surprised nothing rotated, but it was most likely because there were too many storms around for any to rotate and try to produce a tornado.

When they realized there was a fire coming from the back of the 1532 Beverly St. home, they got outside, but had to leave their Miniature Pinscher Snoopy and her two puppies inside.

Assistant Fire Chief Tanner Drake said the main part of the fire was in the back bedroom, and due to the evening wind that picked up at the same time, the fire quickly grew to a level firefighters usually don’t see inside the city.

Flames were “shooting out like 10 or 15 feet into the air,” out of the window, Drake said.

Drake said they were able to get the fire under control within about 15 minutes, but the cause was still under investigation.

Hicks and her family appeared relieved later to discover that Snoopy was OK, although they all had little more than the clothes on their backs, some documents Hicks had in a safe and some partly burned family pictures, including that of Hicks’ fiancé Cornelius Washington, who was the victim of a homicide in February 2008.

Hicks said she had been renting the home for three years.

“They have nothing. They have absolutely nothing,” said Joanne’s mother Judy Hicks, 49. “It’s like somebody dropped them out the sky.”

Although neighbors donated some clothes for her and the kids, Joanne said the Hickses had nothing else and would have to stay with her mother for the near future.

No one was home at the time of the fire. The cause of the fire is unknown at this time.