This morning at approximately 01:15am, City of Hudson Firefighters were dispatched by Columbia 911 to a report of a possible structure fire at 34 Fairview Avenue in the City of Hudson. The initial report came in as a fire in the wall.

Within minutes 1st Asst. Chief Shawn Hoffman and 2nd Asst. Chief Nicolas Pierro arrived on scene and reported a working fire on the 3rd floor of the building. The fire was rapidly spreading throughout the porch area and into the attic. Police Officers from the Hudson City Police Department and the Columbia County Sheriffs Office arrived on scene and began evacuating residents from the six apartments within the building.

Under the direction of Chief Anthony DeMarco Jr., crews immediately went to work on the fire. Engine 30-25 stretched several handlines to the rear stairwell and began extinguishing the fire. Tower 32-55 was deployed to the roof and their crew immediately vented the building by cutting several ventilation holes above the fire. Crews from Engine 28-28 and Engine/Rescue 27-42 assisted with fire suppression and overhaul. Crews were assisted on scene by Catskill, Greenport, and Claverack.

"Our members made an excellent stop on what could have been a major fire. Aggressive engine and truck work quickly stopped the fire from spreading across the attic and contained it to the third floor apartments. It was a great job by all!" says Chief DeMarco.

Chief DeMarco reports the fire was ruled accidental and was caused by smoking materials on the 3rd floor porch. There were no reported injuries.

While the fire department was on scene on Fairview Avenue, several other fire departments stood by at our Central Station including Athens, Stottville, Germantown, Chatham, and Stuyvesant. Our mutual aid departments standing by handled an additional emergency call at the FASNY Firemans Home. Staff at the facility reported smelling an odor of something burning. The odor turned out to be smoke from the fire on Fairview Avenue.

Additional agencies assisting on scene were the Columbia County Fire Coordinators Office, the Greenport Rescue Squad, City of Hudson Code Enforcement Office and National Grid.

Units were back in service around 3:30am.