Lorraine report in, chief calls it quits

By Richard Gaines and Patrick Anderson
Staff Writers

February 27, 2009 09:19 am

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Click to read highlights of the "After Action Report"

Report: Hazards neglected by owners set stage for disaster

Fire Chief Barry McKay announced his retirement yesterday, three days after receiving a scathing independent report on his department's daring but chaotic and confused response to the eight-alarm Lorraine Apartments inferno in December 2007.

The long-awaited report by New Hampshire-based Municipal Resources Inc. found a systemic lack of command and control during the blaze that began before midnight on a frigid Dec. 14 and built into a four-story bonf ire, taking down the 1910 wood-frame apartment building of 25 tenants and claiming one man's life.

"The department was unprepared to battle a fire of this size," the report concluded. "Personnel had not been sufficiently trained, and pre-planning and inspections were not routinely done."

The report also chastised the owner, the business partnership of Daniel Gatineri and Gary Raso, for lax maintenance which allowed the Lorraine to be become a more dangerous building than it needed to be, and the city for inattention (See related story).

One resident, Robert Taylor, died in the blaze despite firefighters' heroic efforts to pull him out a third-story window. Also destroyed was Temple Ahavat Achim, which had little elbow room just east of the apartment building.

The blaze also seared and scarred nearly all the nearby buildings. Embers blown by the stiff winds landed on roofs throughout downtown.

The $10,000 report was commissioned a year ago by then newly installed Mayor Carolyn Kirk, who released it to the Times yesterday along with McKay's retirement letter.

She described the report as pointing the city toward a "moment, a turning point, a need to master the modern principals of a professional firefighting/paramedic department."

Kirk said the 84-page report of a three-person team led by George Klauber, the fire chief in Derry, N.H., identifies the "breadth and depth of the reforms and changes that are needed."

A member of the department for 35 years — and its chief for nearly 26 — McKay, 58, made no direct reference to the Lorraine fire or the after incident report in his letter of retirement, which becomes effective March 29.

"My retirement comes with mixed emotions," McKay's letter said. "I can only praise and thank the firefighters of this city for making due with the limited resources and maintaining the fire and emergency services. The firefighters I have worked with since the early 1970s have truly been the finest public servants and best people I've ever known."

But he did advise Kirk that the chief's workload "cannot be handled by one person any longer."

Kirk said she would name an interim chief next week.

Capt. Barry Aptt, who led the first team into the building, and Deputy Chief Miles Schlichte, who has made no secret of his disdain for McKay, declined to comment on the report yesterday.

McKay's isolation from the rest of the force reflects the management-labor structure in Gloucester. Here, only the chief is management, the rest of the force from deputies on down are in the same union.

Still, McKay seemed especially isolated. In 2006, his aloneness was dramatized during the fifth anniversary service for the terrorist attacks and the destruction of the World Trade Center Towers in New York.

Rather than participate in the city's official memorial service, about 20 firefighters, including eight who were on duty, joined Schlichte in a separate service away from Central Fire Station.

At the time, Schlichte made clear he considered McKay a failed chief, saying he had allowed the department become "dangerous and dysfunctional."

He was suspended by then-Mayor John Bell, but when Schlichte chose to have his Civil Service hearing in public, the sanctions were dropped.

Richard Gaines can be reached at rgaines@gloucestertimes.com. Patrick Anderson can be reached at panderson@gloucestertimes.com.

Read Ex Fire Chief Barry McKay's retirement letter below.

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