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Date: 8/3/2022
RUSSELL – After only a month on the job, Russell’s Fire Chief Edward J. Renauld Jr. underwent a trial by fire when the stock house of the former Strathmore Paper Company burned to the ground on July 26 in Woronoco.
Although new to Russell, Renauld of Huntington has 33 years experience in firefighting, having served seven years in the Air Force and 26 years at Westover Air Reserve Base in Chicopee, where he retired as the assistant chief of Fire Prevention in April.
“Everybody did great,” said Renauld about the mill fire. “Those are tough responses; not much you can do in a situation like that. It’s an old mill that’s been vacant for years. Who knows what was stored in it.” He said the priority was to make sure everybody was safe.
“The priority is to keep all the responders safe and do your best to keep the fire from spreading. It did get into the other building a bit, but one of the crews – I think Agawam – was able to go in and extinguish it before it spread or we’d still be there,” Renauld said two days later. He said crews were also able to keep the fire from spreading to nearby residential properties.
Renauld said they were lucky with the weather, which was not very windy and not very hot, so they didn’t have to deal with dehydration. The Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency also sent their rehab trailer, bringing food and water for the firefighters, and a place to rest.
As the new fire chief, Renauld replaced Wayne Precanico, chairman of the Board of the Selectmen in Russell, who had been serving as interim fire chief since the retirement of former Deputy Chief Stuart Eggleston in April after 12 years with the department, during which he had also been serving as interim chief. Precanico had no firefighting experience.
Precanico said the position of fire chief in the town was posted a couple of times with no response. “I happened to be talking to Ed [Renauld] and he mentioned he was retiring from the Westover Fire Department. He officially became our fire chief on June 21,” he said.
Renauld, who is himself chairman of the Huntington Board of Selectmen, said in the absence of a fire chief, the job automatically falls to the town executive.
“[Precanico] did his best, kept the trucks maintained and handled the administration really well,” he said, adding, “He’d tell you himself, he had no business being on the fire crew. Lucky for him, he had some great people in that department who carried on the operational side.”
“I’m relying on them too,” Renauld said. “Most of my career I’ve spent in fire prevention. I haven’t been in operations in a long time,” he said, acknowledging that he had a lot of help during the Strathmore Mill fire from Russell Emergency Management Director Michael Morrissey and Blandford Fire Chief David Mottor, who were first on the scene, and coordinated with Russell Assistant Chief Nate Kowaczyk to formulate a plan and start executing it.
Renauld was out of town when the fire started, and it took him a couple of hours to get there, he said.
Two days later on July 28, Renauld said the fire was still smoldering under brick in the rubble. “We got called out this morning, because someone reported smoke. We just put more water on it.” He said there is very little water at the site, which required tanker shuttles and drafting tanks as part of the mutual aid.
“We had a whole bunch [of tanker transports] – 20 of them, during the fire. They just kept making round trips and filling up drafting tanks,” he said.
Later that morning, Renauld, Russell-Montgomery Police Chief Kevin Hennessey, and State Fire Marshal Peter J. Ostroskey reported that the fire had started when Donald Voudren, the building’s owner, used an oxygen-acetylene torch near the exterior of the structure, sparking a blaze that spread to a second building across the street.
The Russell Fire Department issued Voudren a notice of violation documenting his failure to comply with the Massachusetts Comprehensive Fire Safety Code, according to the press release.
“The State Fire Code requires a permit for cutting, welding, and other hot work,” stated Ostroskey. “A fire that started with unpermitted hot work claimed two firefighters’ lives in 2014, and we’re extremely fortunate that no one was injured or worse during this incident.”
Renauld said he is looking forward to continuing his career in fire service in Russell.
“I’m excited to do it. I enjoy being part of the fire service, and I thought it was an opportunity to do something different that I haven’t done, run a department, with a great group of firefighters,” he said.
“It’s been great so far. I plan to be there for a while, I’m just getting my feet wet,” Renauld added.