By ROBERT LINNEHAN
Despite a quick on the scene presence by the Haddonfield police and some fast thinking by a landscaper, an 89-year-old disable senior citizen died in a house fire on Tuesday, March 8.
According to Haddon Fire Co. №1 Chief Joe Riggs, a house fire on the 800 block of Edge Park Drive took the life Frank Berry, 89. Haddon Fire Co. №1, Cherry Hill, Haddon Heights, and Westmont Fire Company responded to the scene.
Upon arrival at 2:53 p.m., firefighters encountered heavy smoke throughout the entire first floor of the house. The fire was quickly extinguished with minimal fire damage to the home.
But several members of the Haddonfield Police Department were the first to the scene. Haddonfield Patrolmen Robert Shreve and Chris Kosofsky, along with Sgt. Ed Wiley, were the first rescuers to arrive at the home.
Shreve and Kosofsky went to the rear of the house where they quickly found that smoke was pouring out of the back windows. Wiley remained in the front of the house and made his way into the home with a fire extinguisher from his patrol car.
Wiley said his training as a volunteer fire fighter before his career began as a police officer quickly came back to him as he made his way through the smoke filled house. He kept low, he recalled, and tried to knock down some of the flames with his extinguisher. The flames were reflecting off of the smoke, making visibility extremely limited.
Wiley went into the house as far as he could before the smoke drove him back out of the home. In the rear of the building, Shreve and Kosofsky were breaking windows to clear out some of the smoke before they would try to enter.
A nearby employee from a landscaping employee came to the scene and gave Shreve a pair of heavy work gloves that the officer used to break the shards of glass remaining around the windowsill.
Using a stepladder also provided by the landscaper, Shreve said he yelled into the home, trying to get an answer from the victim, but nothing was ever returned.
“I was hoping we’d get a chance to help him. That’s what we’re here for in this town, but unfortunately I guess it wasn’t meant to be,” he said.
Before the officers had a chance to enter the house, a fire fighter from a Cherry Hill Department came to the scene and entered the house with his oxygen pack. The fire fighter located the man in about 30 seconds, Shreve recalled.
It was determined that Berry accidentally set the fire after he lit a cigarette while using his oxygen tank. His daughter was on the scene at the time of the incident and was the one who made the initial emergency 911 call.
