Westwood Fire Station 1 condemned due to snow damage from blizzard

WESTWOOD, Mass. — Last week the Westwood Fire Department decided that their operations out of Westwood Fire Station 1 had to be moved.

Historic snowfall we saw last week damaged the floor and became hazardous for firefighters.

Not too long ago there was a vote for a new fire station to be built in the town of Westwood, but the majority vote said no.

Across the street from the fire station is Bob Tucker. On Monday, he weighed in a bit on why a new station was necessary in the first place.

“I was in favor of the new fire station, particularly since I’ve had multiple occasions to visit since I know some of the fireman, and they’ve kind of shown me some of the conditions that they labor under which I thought this is really bad,” explained Tucker.

On Monday, Boston 25 went to the fire station and witnessed the damage firsthand, indents in the floors and a crumbling ceiling were just a few of the major concerns.

Fire Chief Steven Lund says last week’s blizzard only made things worse.

“Because of all the storm and everything it’s been very cold the floor had been deteriorating, and it just came to head. At that point I got a call from the firefighters. I was at a conference I had to come in after they said that the floor started heaving, bad,” said Lund.

Just last Thursday, the building was deemed unsafe by engineers.

“We can no longer house a ladder truck or fire engine in this station because this is where they were he said it’s not strong to hold the trucks anymore,” explained Lund.

Bob Pollard owns Pollard’s Test Kitchen two blocks from the fire station. He explained to me why there might have been concerns over the construction of a new station house.

“I think there was some feelings that who was being rushed, and there wasn’t enough input into the size the cost so forth,” said Pollard.

“Then also the congestion that it’s going to incur, and the money that it’s going to incur is going to be pretty heavy for the town to hold,”

Firefighters were moved out of the location and are now stationed five minutes down the street.

“The timelines of a response obviously it’s not going to be as good so that has to be a concern,” said Tucker.

“We have three elderly complexes on this side of town. We just added for five minutes response there if someone’s having a heart attack or an emergency and we had four or five minutes to our response time that could be in the difference between life and death,” added Chief Lund.

In the short term, the chief says he’s working on putting up a temporary structure in front of the building.

In the long term, Westwood Town Administrator Conner Read says there is a chance another vote comes about for a new station.

“We are working to have articles go before voters this may to be feasibility and schematic process of kind of mapping out what that could look like after the last one was not approved. We are hoping that somewhere between fall and spring of next year and can go to a vote because we need to get to the permanent fix,” said Read.

Citizens like Tucker told Boston 25 that they hope there is a different outcome this time around.

“I am hopeful that they recognized that the need is real and serious and as a town, we need to get together and move forward with getting a new fire station in place,” said Tucker.

Lund is working with neighboring departments to ensure Westwood gets the quickest response possible.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates as more information becomes available.

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