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8-27-63 Crash Kills 2 Firemen; Call False By John Rutledge Two Dallas Firemen were killed, two policemen critically injured and two other firemen hurt at 1 a.m. Tuesday when a fire truck and police car collided at high speed at Zang and Davis in oak Cliff as a result of a tragic false alarm. Dead were Fire Capt. W. J. Jones and fireman J. H. Jones. Critically hurt were patrolmen L. B. Kirkpatrick and Ray Underwood. Less seriously injured were fireman W. A. Massie and fireman W. B. Strickland Jr. All were sped to Methodist Hospital. Fire and police investigators said the cab and trailer type ladder truck was running east on Davis to answer a pulled fire alarm box at Sixth and Denver—a false alarm turned in by a prankster. Kirkpatrick and Underwood were speeding north on Zang to intercept a wanted car chased across the Houston Street Viaduct by another police car, fellow officers believe. Both vehicles were using sirens. Robert Cox, 22, of 2810 Sutton told accident investigator G. N. Hoskins he watched from a filling station on a corner as the unmarked blue police car slammed into the right side of the fire engine. He said firemen flew through the air as they were knocked from seats and running boards. The police car seemed to spin into the air, landing on two of the firemen. Both officers were pinned in the police car. The long ladder truck slammed sideways onto a gas station apron, and fishtailed down the street until the driver was able to bring it to a halt more than half a block away. 8-28-63 FATAL ALARM Box 634 Will Always Stir Pang Box 634 will long be remembered by Dallas Firemen. Instead of signaling an emergency, the alarm box at East Sixth and Denver in Oak Cliff became a prankster's toy and a death trap for two members of No. 15 truck company early Tuesday. Box 634 did as it was supposed to do when activated. It flashed an alarm on the control panel at fire headquarters. The alarm, however, was false. As a result Fire Capt. W. J. Jones and second driver J. H. Jones died trying to reach the box when their aerial ladder truck and a police car collided. The prankster who triggered the box is not alone. Since 1960, firemen say, false alarms have increased by 40 percent. But Box 634 has proved to be the deadliest one—so far. Patrolman Dies; Third Crash Victim Two Firemen Killed Instantly As Fire Truck, Police Car Hit By James Ewell A Dallas policeman became the third victim of a prankster's false fire alarm early Tuesday when a fire truck answering the alarm and a police car slammed together as they crossed paths at Zang and Davis. Two firemen were killed instantly. The squad car driver, patrolman Ray Allen Underwood, 26, of 4620 Silver Lake Drive, died 3 ½ hours later while undergoing surgery in Methodist Hospital. Two members of Truck Company 15, Bishop and Davis, were knocked out of the 46-foot long aerial ladder truck and crushed to death under the rear wheels. They were Capt. W. J. Jones, 39, of 1720 Springlake, Mesquite, station commander, and second driver J. H. Jones, 37, of 3328 Seevers. They were not related. Patrolman L. B. Kirkpatrick, 33, of 709 SE Third, Grand Prairie, the most critically injured of the crash survivors, waged a life or death battle in Methodist Hospital Tuesday night. The fire department sent all available arson squads on a search for the prankster. The tragic collision shortly after 12:40 a.m. was followed by two other traffic accidents which left two persons dead. Police called the toll of five traffic deaths the worst since 1956 for any single day. Fire officials called the police car-fire truck crash the worst involving personnel responding to an alarm in 18 years. The worst on record claimed three firemen in 1945 as they raced to a trash fire. Police and fire officials described the tragedy as "senseless…a waste of lives." Adding to the agony was the disclosure that the police car racing to assist another squad in pursuit of a speeder, did so without proper clearance from police dispatchers. Police said Kirkpatrick and Underwood were using an unmarked police car to carry out a special assignment in a high-burglary area of Oak Cliff. The squad car proceeded north on Zang without notifying dispatchers—apparently to intercept a speeder being chased across Houston Street Viaduct into Oak Cliff by another squad, police said. At this time, the 5-man aerial truck company roared out of the station house on Bishop to answer a pull box alarm to the east at Denver and East Sixth. Three blocks from the station house, the fire truck, sirens wide open and warning lights flashing, entered the intersection from the west on Davis. Seconds earlier, another fire company had cleared it. Fire, Police Widows To Receive payments The City of Dallas Tuesday made arrangements for providing some relief for the widows and children of two firemen and a policeman killed in the collision of a police car and fire truck. The relief amounts to this: The firemen and policemen, being members of the police, firemen's and fire alarm operators' pension fund, left their widows eligible to receive one fourth of the monthly base pay of $425 (as prescribed by pension regulations) for the rest of their lives unless they remarry. The widows also will receive half of the service pay allotted to their husbands. This will mean $1 a month for each of the number of years of service each had accumulated before death. Children of the victims under 17 will be entitled to a one fourth share of the base pay. A $5,000 insurance check also will be delivered to each of widows. |