A firefighter died while fighting a house fire. He was in charge of the pumper truck crew which was called to a home. The fire was caused by a fireplace insert which had been designed for an electrical heating unit but was modified for wood-burning purposes. As part of this homemade conversion, a thin concrete slab had been inserted over the wooden floor joists. The homeowner had just used the fireplace for several hours to provide heat because of a gas furnace failure. Heat had transferred down through the concrete hearth to ignite the floor and the basement ceiling. The fire had […]