BRENHAM BUSINESS DESTROYED BY EARLY MORNING FIRE
A Brenham business was destroyed by fire early Monday morning shortly after midnight.
When the fire department arrived, they found the building, Brentex Pallets totally engulfed in flames.
A second alarm was requested for manpower along with mutual aid response from Salem, Gay Hill, Chappell Hill, and Meyersville Fire Departments.
The entire 21,000 square ft. building and surrounding stacks of wooden pallets were burning when the first engines arrived on scene. The fire department worked to ensure the fire did not spread to other surrounding businesses.
Two Brenham aerial ladder trucks and an Engine were used to control the fire.
The cause of the fire is under investigation by the Brenham Fire Marshal's office.
The business was located behind the Fireman’s Training Center, and firefighters have been out most of the night putting out the fire and hot spots.
Photo courtesy of John Santos.
We would like to thank ALL the men & women of the Brenham Fire Department and ALL of the Washington County Volunteer Fire Department’s that responded to the fire from the bottom of our heart.
The departments and community did a wonderful job in responding and fighting the fire….it was massive and the plan to contain the fire did keep the other business from being in danger. No one was injured and they worked through many hours of fighting the fire with the weather not being on their side. They did an amazing job!!
We wish we could have thanked each one personally for their service that morning. Thanks for all the prayers, love and support from the community, each day is easier.
From the Rybarski Family
God Bless your family, and best wishes to you all as you recover from this tragedy.
I am the Mother of a firefighter. First and foremost… It is in their hearts to serve and protect. It is born in them just like someone getting the calling to be a preacher… and yes I agree totally we need a second station. But do not talk ugly about the men and women that put their lives on the line everyday so you can be safe. They save lives. They are trained to go into smoky, burning buildings to save you and they do… I could name a few fireman that are now burned , in wheelchairs because of the love for job in their heart and they would do it again. Read the Firemans Prayer…. Could you do that??? Enough of all this talk. The main thing is too support the family and their loss and thank the Lord above that no one perished and all firefighters were ok..We just have to pray our officials open their eyes one day. We have to know it is was in God’s hands.
Very well said Sarah.
I have had my business adjacent to Brentex pallets for 7 years. The family that owned this business is one of the most generous family’s. Anytime I needed anything from them Sotty and his dad always said yes. I feel for them and would like to see this community pull together to help them out. I would also like to thank the Brenham Fire Department for keeping the fire contained. There could have been 3 businesses out of business this morning but there wasn’t. Thanks BFD!!
This place was so much more than just a Business, my prayers to the owners, their families and the employees in this devistating loss.
Sometimes you can read a news story and get news! But then when reading the comments you find out what people are really thinking! Yes I feel sorry for the families and employees at this business. No I do not feel that 30 minutes was the run time. I am really proud of our fire dept as well as the surrounding fire depts. What I am upset about is how can you all complain about the new animal adoption center? We have needed improvement with our county animal control center for years! Come on Brenham, wake up! Our town is growing and needing improvements, we need a new improvement to our current shelter. Maybe if we did not have all the dog breeders out there people may adopt from our shelter more often, instead of those poor animals being euthanized !
Our town needs another fire station to to provide quicker and better services. The fire department is great, but we are way behind keeping up with the growth. A second station has been talked about for years, but does not seem like a priority. City government needs to wake up and get caught up. Why do we have to wait till something drastic happens before something is done? The fire department is short staffed and has been for years. Volunteer numbers are falling and are at the lowest it’s ever been. People in the city think everything is fine and dandy, but if you go talk to the staff at the station it is way short of being fine. A second station and more manpower is desperately needed. Wake up people! Don’t wait for something bad to happen to one of your loved ones or someone you know before you start voicing your concern. The time is NOW! Firefighter forever
My view looking in from the outside in a actually seeing the fire scene, there’s no way this could been a 1 alarm fire. Wirh the fuel load and fuel type this would be a multiple alarm fire even with the proper apparatus and personnel. The threat of fire spreading to adjacent structure and running on them through the heavy load of fine fuels in nearby fields could be cotrol with apparatus and personnel provided in a multiple alarm. I would much rather have units in route I can cancel as opposed to arriving on scene and realizing I don’t have adaquate resources.
Can we please focus on what is important here? The Brenham Fire Department and surrounding county departments did an amazing job keeping this fire from spreading to surrounding businesses and causing any more damage. Also, keep the family in mind. Their family business has just burnt to the ground. I know they are in my prayers. This is not the time to make up ridiculous lies about response time or to debate the need of a second fire station. All I ask is that you FOCUS! Find a local fire fighter today and shake his/her hand for the difficult job that they do. Also, stop and say a prayer for comfort for the family as they go through this difficult time.
Coming from a career firefighter this should have only been a one alarm fire with correct number of apparatus/ personnel. Looking from the outside this should have been a simple defensive fire operation. Just one more reason why BFD needs more paid personnel and a second station. Take a moment and think what if another incident would have occurs at the same time as this one and all resources are tied up unable to respond.
This is not pick on Brenham FD day! Agreed, they do need another station with more FF’s, but that is not how it is right now. I think they made the correct call and the station was covered in case another incident dropped. Plus, if worse came to worse, there were other county depts. that can be called in to help-just as they were on this one.
Yes we do need another staffed fire station .BUT your attitude is one of the reasons this town is short of volunteer firefighters. A lot of bigger towns or cities have all volunteer or part paid and part volunteer departments. You know how they make it work? They get along by working together and leave their egos at home. Ask some of the volunteers who stopped volunteering and you will find the answer why they stopped. It does not have to be all about paid firemen and higher taxes. I have been a professional volunteer firefighter for over 25 years.
First of all volunteerism is at an all time low, whether its the Red Cross or Little League. I’m sure it’s nothing about egos or anything of the like. I have personally applied to volunteer for the Brenham fire department and once I found out that I had to work functions at the fire training center, I politely backed away. Also, I feel many other potential volunteers, like myself, have an issue serving alcohol to patrons of the many functions held there. Another thing, I spend enough time away from my family with work and other obligations, to stay late into the night till early morning hours cleaning the fire training center. I have a question for the Brenham Fire Department, do you conduct yourself as a fire department or an entertainment department? I think there should be a separation between the two entities…either you want to be a fire department or a bartender/cleaning service… Do you really think the other bigger all volunteer and combination departments have to work a “training center”? I think not, they concentrate on training and being a professional fire service provider, not bartenders… Don’t blame the egos as to why they stopped volunteering it could be other things….
I have been a volunteer member of the Brenham Fire Department for 7 years. I am an EMS supervisor by trade in neighboring Fayette County. I am also not scared to post my real name when voicing criticisms of an organization’s professional practices. The operations of the Brenham Firemens training center have purchased 10s (if not 100s) of Thousands of dollars in equipment for fire suppression that would have otherwise been spent by the taxpayers of the City of Brenham. I too as a career member of public safety have my reservations about working the training center, and AT NO POINT IN MY 7 YEARS WITH THE BRENHAM FIRE DEPARTMENT HAVE I BEEN CRITICIZED FOR NOT TAKING PART IN THIS PARTICULAR FUNCTION OF THE BFD. So if you’d like to apply, I readily invite you to come on over, but am quite sure that the reason you elected not to go through with your application had much less to do with the Training Center than you state. No matter what the issues facing departments, be it egos, training centers, etc… Volunteerism is at an all-time low in this country because the chase of the almighty dollar is instilled in our youth more than a sense of community, and helping others. Until this sense of community and philanthropy is restored, volunteerism will continue to wither.
Wow what tragic for that business. My prayers go out for those employees.
Probably would not have taken 30 min to get there if we had a fire station in the industrial park as was proposed when the police station was built, instead we get a dog kennel. That ought to help with insurance rates. Maybe its time to change the underwear up at city hall.
30 minutes? How do you know it took them 30 minutes to get there? Do you have a copy of the run report? Is that a verified response time? It’s only about 3 miles from the station, how could it take 30 minutes to get there? They could get to Navasota in 30 minutes. Maybe it took some of the mutual aid companies a little longer to get there, but that is standard with any agency. I don’t know how long it took them to arrive because I wasn’t there, nor have I seen the report, but I find 30 minutes a little hard to believe. With that said, I understand your frustration with the city choosing to spend money on a “dog kennel” instead of improving our public safety, but making exaggerated claims such as taking 30 minutes to get to the scene not only ruins the credibility of your argument, it causes me, and anyone else whom you’re trying to convince, to not take you seriously.
I was there within 20 mins and I drove in from the west of town. By the time I got there, BFD and several other departments were already on scene and flowing water. So, yes I agree that a new station is warranted, but get your facts straight before you start spewing misinformation. I would bet you that the first Engine was there within 5 mins of the first call-wanta bet???
The date July 30 1993 BRENHAM Banner Press headlines reads
Fire dept says substation needed soon just think how much of a better price a station could have been 20 years ago