The mother and child were transported to local hospitals following the incident and underwent emergency surgery. 

On Christmas Eve, the 37-year-old driver Charlene Rios died from her injuries.  

The accident took place on the 7700 block of Harrisons Road with a Naval Support Activity Hampton Roads Fire and Emergency fire engine.

The preliminary investigation revealed the firetruck was exiting the fire station at Baker Street with the emergency lights and sirens activated. The SUV driven by Rios was traveling northbound on Hampton Boulevard when it hit the truck.  

Fire Chief Amy Ramon says crews are literally running into the problem on a daily basis.  

“The trees are growing and getting older. With that, the canopies are getting larger. Where the newer subdivisions have smaller trees in their front yards, as they age, they go over the curb and come down into the path of the regular street,” she said. “Just the other day, we were trying to access a patient with a medical emergency. Because of the trees on their street, we could not bring the ladder truck to their house. The crew had to park the truck and walk to the house for the medical emergency.”

As a result, Cy-Fair VFD is asking for people to raise canopies to over 13 feet.

Delaware firefighters all soon will be using the same mayday signal, an attempt to keep them better coordinated if the worst should happen. Individual agencies are being trained in the new procedure.   

The change is more a standardization of practice than a policy change, assuring each of the state's 61 companies and seven dispatch centers behave in unison when a firefighter is in danger. Different dispatch centers and stations previously use independent responses to maydays. 

"It puts all the firefighters on the same page. We respond with the county. The county comes in and responds with us on large fires," said Wilmington Fire Chief Michael Donohue. "When a mayday comes in, that's serious business. We don't want to have a communication breakdown." Efforts to standardize the mayday signal began more than three years ago with a former Wilmington firefighter, Jack Wilson, incoming fire chief at Seaford Volunteer Fire Department and an educator at the Delaware State Fire School. His work culminated in June when the Delaware State Chiefs Association voted to adopt a universal procedure. 

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