Cooling Off

Here is a note from the Manager on the heat wave:

The City of Lowell will open a " COOL DOWN CENTER" today at The Senior Center at 276 Broadway Street in Lowell 1:00pm to 10:00pm.  Air conditioning and cold bottled water will be available in the Great Hall.  In addition City Pool hours will be extended by 1 hour on Tuesday and Wednesday.  See [LINK].

It is a step.

A lot of things didn't help with the heat, such as the power failure down town about 2:30 PM.  Martha and I were at the Worthen for lunch, along with two friends from Texas.  Trying to show them a little local color.  The lady behind the bar had just turned on the overhead fan system for a demo and the power died.  We were then going to go to the library to look at the big painting, but they had also lost power.

The city opening facilities to help folks cool off was a good move, to which I say "thank you".

Later in the day I wondered if there were heat injuries down at the corner of Nesmith and Merrimack.  About 6:45 tonight, returning from the western part of town, via VFW Highway, I came across the bridge and was shunted off to the East.  It looked like three pieces of fire equipment and three ambulances and several police cars, blocking the road in all directions.  I saw no sign of fire, which is why I thought heat related injuries.  We will see what The Sun has in the AM.

UPDATE:  It was a fire.  Here is the report on the fire during last evening's rush hour.

hree firefighters were taken to a local hospital with what appeared to be heat exhaustion after a 2-alarm fire possibly started by careless disposal of cigarettes struck a building at Nesmith and East Merrimack streets yesterday.

Crews were called to 356 East Merrimack St., about 6 p.m., for a report of a fire outside a second-floor porch in the rear of a large yellow home that contains seven apartments.

Isn't this the house that had a fire a while ago, across from the Saints Memorial parking lot?  I seem to remember it being draped with plastic sheeting for a while before it was repaired.

And, The Sun reports that the power failure was due to a truck driving in the Connector and snagging a power line.  Maybe the heat made the power line sag.

Regards  —  Cliff