Firefighters found the blaze strongest at the northwest corner of the house, as seen from a neighboring backyard, above, and from Hudson Avenue, below. (Click to enlarge)

By JOHN T. WARD

Two Red Bank families escaped safely as a predawn fire tore through a Hudson Avenue house Thursday.

One half of the structure, at 46-48 Hudson, was fully involved in flames when firefighters arrived on the scene shortly after 3 a.m., said fire Chief Josh Sanders.

Police patrol units, which were already there, reported that the occupants had escaped safely, he said.

Volunteer firefighters train water on the northwest corner, as seen from Clay Street. (Click to enlarge)

Four adults, two children and three dogs were in the house at the time of the fire, said one of the occupants, Ryan Howard, who was asleep in a second-floor bedroom when the fire broke out.

“I heard the kids next door screaming as they were running out of the house,” said Howard, who lived in the southern half of the two-story structure, at number 48. “Then I saw orange light.”

Ryan said he, his wife and their two dogs were easily able to exit. The couple next door, their two boys and a dog also exited safely, he said.

Firefighters described the blaze as one of the fastest-moving they’d seen in years, though they managed to largely confine it to the northern half the structure at number 46. Northwesterly winds pushed heavy smoke to the ground for blocks around.

The mid-block house is owned by Ray Rapcavage, who also owns several other rental properties on the street.

In an unwritten opinion, Judge Anthony Mellaci ruled from the bench in Freehold Friday that a municipal court judge had given “misplaced” credibility to the accusers of firefighter Justin Hughes, said Hughes’s attorney, Scott Servilla.

Hughes, 29, was found guilty of harassment for provocative statements, which he denied making, that 25-year-old Steven Lang, a former Marine, “should have died in Iraq.”

The alleged insults, in the Sea Bright firehouse bar during a wetdown ceremony for a new truck, were said to have incited attacks on Hughes by Lang and his brother, Peter Lang, 33. The scuffles, in which Hughes claimed he was injured, were captured on closed-circuit security video.

Lang and his brother were both convicted by Little Silver municipal court judge James Berube of assaulting Hughes.

All three came away with the same sentence: $500 in penalties, as well as a requirement to perform 100 hours of community service.

But Servilla, himself a Sea Bright fireman for 28 years, said Mellaci found that “there was insufficient proof to find that Justin had even made those statements.”

Asked to comment, Servilla said the ruling “speaks for itself. It was always clear to several people that Justin didn’t make any such statements.”

He declined to comment further, except to say that the events of October 9, 2010, were not representative of the character of the volunteer fire squad, which “has moved on in a positive direction” under the leadership of Chief Chad Murphy.

Hughes told redbankgreen that Mellaci’s ruling left him with “a smile on my face that couldn’t be any wider.”

It was unclear late Friday if the Langs had also appealed their convictions. William Wilson, the lawyer who represented the Langs, could not be reached for comment.

All three firefighters were expected to face disciplinary action by the borough council for violating employee policy. Hughes said he will now seek to have that action against him terminated based on Mellaci’s ruling.

By JOHN T. WARD

A fire that appeared to start in mulch caused limited damaged to a Red Bank auto dealership Sunday morning.

Volunteer firefighters, responding to an alarm at Red Bank Nissan, on East Newman Springs Road, arrived shortly after 10 a.m. to find a portion of the western wall ablaze beneath metal siding panels, they said.

The fire appeared to have started in mulch that abutted the facade, allowing the flames to contact the structural wood underneath, firefighters said.

The blaze was quickly brought under control without any evident damage to the dealer’s cars, though the showroom filled with smoke.

By JOHN T. WARD

A fire that neighbors said was preceded by a loud bang caused heavy damage to a Middletown home early Tuesday afternoon.

Witnesses said the fire appeared to begin in or near debris piled against the east side of the house, at 231 Bamm Hollow Road, near the intersection of Red Hill Road.

“I heard a loud bang, like a truck dropping a load of something, and didn’t think anything of it,” neighbor Sal Cammarato told redbankgreen. About five minutes later, he said, “my mom looked outside and said, ‘Did you see all the black smoke?’”

Cammarato said the fire appeared to begin in debris piled against the east side of the house, and quickly consumed the east wall, burning through a section of second-story roof, which collapsed.

No injuries were reported and no official information about the blaze was immediately available. Volunteer firefighters from across the township appeared to have the fire under control at about 2:30 p.m.

The house, listed in property records as belonging to Franklin Bailey and Claudette Fuller, was not occupied at the time, neighbors said. Set several hundred feet back from the road on a wooded hill, the location appeared to challenge the ability of firefighters to position an aerial tower to pour water onto the fire.

The spending plan includes debt service on the estimated $1 million cost of a replacing 25-year-old Ladder 91, above. 

By JOHN T. WARD

Still a work in progress, the 2012 Red Bank budget calls for a $94 tax increase on property assessed at the borough-average $401,393, officials said Wednesday night.

The figure  reflects a 4.5-percent increase in the municipal rate, to 53.2 cents per $100 of assessed value, from 50.9 in 2011, said Chief Financial Officer Colleen Lapp.

Driving the increase is an unexpected $464,000 spike in insurance costs, “the majority of it health insurance;” tax-appeal refunds, which in the first two months of the year have already rung up to $135,000; and a contractual $118,000 increase in pay for police, said Lapp.

Councilman Mike DuPont, who heads the governing body’s finance committee, which is responsible for crafting the budget, said he’s cautiously optimistic the $20.77 million spending plan, up from $20.15 million, can be trimmed before it is due to be approved on April 25.

The fattest target for trimming, he said, is health insurance, which accounted for more than half of the overall 4.5-percent increase. “We received an increase of almost 22 percent without justification,” DuPont said.

In recent years, borough employees have absorbed higher deductibles, utilization claims have been down, and the borough has gotten refunds from the plan, he said, which makes this year’s increase “disturbing,” he said.

DuPont said he is scheduled to attend a meeting this week with administrators of a joint municipal health insurance fund in which Red Bank is a member.

“I’m saying this is not fair, and we’re not going to pay it,” he said.

The budget benefitted from a couple of turnarounds, as pension costs declined $76,000, and $170,000 that had been set aside for snow removal at the end of last year turned out not to be needed. A year ago, the town was socked with a $540,000 bill for snow removal following the paralyzing blizzard of December 26 and 27, 2010. “We got a late Christmas present this year,” DuPont said.

Debt service costs for the year are “virtually flat” with last year’s level, despite the final approval, also on Wednesday night, of a $1.1 million bond to cover the cost of replacing the volunteer fire department’s sole aerial-ladder truck.

Ladder 91, housed at the Navesink Hook & Ladder station on Mechanic Street, experienced a parts failure during testing last fall, and replacement parts are no longer available. The vehicle, built in 1987, is also now out of compliance with federal safety standards, officials said.

The preliminary budget increase complies with state caps on both spending and levies, Lapp said.

A public presentation on the elements of the spending plan will be held before the April 25 adoption hearing, but not date has yet been set, DuPont said.

By JOHN T. WARD

Already handicapped by the failure of its aerial ladder truck, Red Bank’s volunteer fire department is now facing an interim during which it will also be without its sole tower truck, redbankgreen has learned.

The 11-year-old tower – a vehicle with an 93-foot extendable platform from which firefighters can train water onto a fire from overhead – is due for maintenance that could take it out of service for a week or more, says borough Administrator and Fire Marshal Stanley Sickels.

The outage means that the borough would have to rely on mutual aid from Middletown in the event of a hard-to-reach fire, with possibly delayed response times, for both tower and ladder service, said Sickels.

“And in a fire, ever second counts,” Sickels said.

Middletown’s ladder truck couldn’t enter or leave the Hook & Ladder house without use of the parking area across the street. (Click to enlarge)

Both the ladder and the tower are housed at the Navesink Hook & Ladder house on Mechanic Street.

The 100-foot ladder, built in 1987, experienced a cable failure during routine testing in October. Replacement parts are no longer available,  officials said, and a custom repair would cost more than the truck itself is worth. The vehicle is also no longer compliant with OSHA and firefighting safety standards, they said.

The borough council last month introduced a $1.1 million bonding ordinance to pay for a new ladder truck. The existing one remains useful as a carrier of firefighters and equipment, including a 50-foot ground ladder that takes six firefighters to raise, fire department officials said.

With the ladder on limited duty, officials have tried, without success, to get their hands on a suitable replacement for the tower when it goes in for service to P&L Emergency Services in Wall Township.

A surplus truck that’s bound for sale by Middletown Fire Company No. 1 was tried out for fit two weeks ago. But firefighters found they could not get the large vehicle into and out of the house without using the small parking area of the proposed Char restaurant on the opposite side of Mechanic street.

“I know it took us quite a few tries to get it in there,” said John Drucker, president of the Middletown house and a Red Bank fire inspector.

The truck’s 48-foot length, with a large bucket protruding off the back end, made it an iffy proposition for navigating borough streets, Sickels said.

The town has also reached out to New York City in search of spare trucks, without success, he said.

Sickels said he’s been talking to P&L about getting in replacement parts for the tower before it goes in for service “so its not just sitting there. But you never know what they might find when they get it up on the lift.”

Fire Chief Josh Sanders couldn’t be reached for comment.

By JOHN T. WARD

Red Bank taxpayers are facing a cost of up to $1 million to replace an aerial ladder truck, town officials said Wednesday night.

The borough council introduced a $1.1 million bonding ordinance to pay for a new rig, which would replace a 25-year-old truck whose ladder components failed during routine maintenance last year, said Fire Marshal and Administrator Stanley Sickels.

Replacement parts are not available, and the vehicle is no longer compliant with national firefighting equipment standards, he said.

The existing truck, housed at the Navesink Hook & Ladder Company on Mechanic Street, cost the borough about $450,000 when it was built in 1987, Sickels said. Prices have more than doubled since then, he said.

Bids are expected to come in around $950,00 he said. The existing truck has no market value except as scrap, he said.

More than a dozen blue-clad volunteer firefighters turned out in support of the bond introduction. One of them Vince Sarullo, owns an a specialty accounting business located directly opposite the Hook & Ladder house on Mechanic.

“We’re volunteers,” Sarullo told redbankgreen afterward. “The last thing you want is to go to a fire and worry if the equipment is going to fail underneath you.”

By JOHN T. WARD

Two adults escaped unhurt as fire tore through the second story of the Rumson home in which they were living Tuesday night, officials said.

The blaze, reported at 8:15 p.m., caused extensive damage to the upstairs portion of the house at 31 Park Avenue. The was no immediate determination of a cause, authorities said.

The identities of the occupants, said by police to be about 27 and 22 years old, were not immediately released, and the owner of the home was not present at the time of the fire. The house is listed in property records as belonging to Patricia Dalton.

Police Sergeant Bob Boyer, who was the first to arrive on the scene, said flames were shooting out of the front, second-story window just beneath a peaked roof. He found the front door locked, went around the to unlocked back door, and made his way through heavy smoke to the front door, which he unlocked for firefighters, he said.

By then, the two occupants had already departed the house, he said.

“They did a real nice job stopping it from making its way down to the first floor,” Boyer said of the firefighters.

As of 9 p.m., Rumson volunteer firefighters, backstopped by counterparts from Sea Bright and Fair Haven, were putting out the last signs of fire and awaiting the arrival of a JCP&L crew to cut power to a live electrical wire downed in the incident.