The celebratory ribbon cutting in front of a packed Fire Station 71 happened Tuesday afternoon.  

This new location offers several perks for Boardman firefighters.

The 18,000-foot building cost around $3.6 million and has a lot to offer in terms of space, a training facility and several offices -- all under one roof.

"The location is great, you know?" Chief Mark Pitzer said. "Being on a main thoroughfare actually allows us to get to every part of the community within minutes. We can get north, south, east and west pretty rapidly. This also helps us improve our response times to the south end of the township as well."

The 14-member panel has developed a 12-page report for County Manager Mark Schwartz, and will brief County Board members in mid-June. The group’s recommendations are expected to be taken into account as the Arlington government preps to raze the existing fire station, located on Lee Highway in the Halls Hill/High View Park neighborhood, and replace it with a new, two-bay station on the same site.  

Several members of the panel said the most important way to honor the station’s past is to provide for its future.  

“Finally, our neighborhood fire station will become a state-of-the-art station – the men and women who work there deserve the best,” said Marguarite Gooden, who represented the John M. Langston Citizens Association on the working group and whose brother and father worked at Fire Station #8.

The battalion chief was driving westbound on Thomas Street just before 7 p.m. when his vehicle collided with the car travelling northbound on Glasgow Avenue, officials said. Thomas Street has a stop sign at the intersection, Glasgow Avenue does not.   

The intersection is approximately a quarter mile away from fire department headquarters, which is where the battalion chief was headed, Mosby said. The battalion chief's vehicle was not travelling to an emergency and did not have its lights or sirens on, he said. 

 

When police arrived, Wesam Hashish, 43, ran from them and crawled onto the top of a Fairfax County Fire and Rescue ladder truck that had also responded to the scene.  

During five hours of negotiations with police and mental health professionals, Hashish refused to come down. Police said he exposed himself and threw a ladder from the fire truck at officers.