Alameda County Fire Department Says it Wasn't Called To Respond to Drowning in Alameda

In the aftermath of the Memorial Day drowning in Alameda, the Island’s safety agencies aren’t the only ones facing a  over how they responded.

Regional emergency responders, including the , which, along with the Oakland Fire Department, is the next closest rescue agency, have also been fielding a flurry of questions from across the country about their role.

The questioning — directed at agencies that had little-to-nothing to do with the incident — stems from a mix of confusion over jurisdictions and misinformation about which agencies were asked to respond to the emergency.

The incident happened on May 30 when a man believed to be suicidal walked into San Francisco Bay off Alameda’s Crown Beach. Alameda police and fire crews responded but did not go into the water to assist the man. Alameda's Fire Department lacks the certification to do water rescues and the department had a policy in place that prohibited firefighters from entering the water. 

The U.S. Coast Guard responded with a boat, but couldn’t approach the man, later identified as 52-year-old Raymond Zack, because the water was too shallow for their craft. Zack died after being in the water for almost an hour.

Later that night, the Alameda Police Department issued a press release saying it had contacted a number of agencies for assistance with the water rescue, including the Oakland Fire Department, Alameda County Fire Department, the Alameda County Sheriff’s Department, Oakland Police Department and East Bay Regional Park Police District.

But the Oakland and Alameda County Fire departments, both of which have boats and equipment for shallow-water rescues, as well as staff trained for such events, say they were never asked to provide assistance.

“We never received a request for a water rescue response,” said David Lord, deputy fire chief in charge of special operations and communications for the Alameda County Fire Department. He said his agency has fielded dozens of media calls from across the country since Monday, some of them asking why the agency denied aid to its neighbor.  

“I’ve become guilty by association,” said Lord. “But factually I’m nowhere near that scene.”

The Oakland Fire Department also said it was never asked to help with a water rescue. “We did not receive a request for our boat,” said Oakland Fire Department spokesperson Eleanor Bolin-Chew. “We would have gladly sent it.”

After partner agencies challenged City of Alameda safety officials for implying that they didn’t respond to requests for help, Daren Olson, acting deputy chief of operations for the Alameda Fire Department, said they would issue a revised statement acknowledging that other agencies had been contacted, but had not been asked to assist. 

Olson said that during Monday's incident, local safety officials determined that, after weighing the options, the Coast Guard was best equipped to deal with the emergency and had the shortest response time.

“We tried to locate resources as quickly as possible, and resources that could get here as soon as possible,” Olson said. He said the Coast Guard had reported it would take about 20 minutes to reach the man. 

The Alameda County Fire Department, which has two trailered rescue boats — both equipped with inflatable rafts for shallow water emergencies — estimated it would take 30 minutes to launch the boats and arrive at the scene. 

The Oakland Fire Department did get a request for a boat from the U.S. Coast Guard, but not until nearly an hour after emergency personnel were called to the scene. That's about when the man was being  by a private citizen. The request was cancelled before the boat was deployed. 

All emergency fire and medical calls within the City of Alameda are routed through the Alameda County Regional Emergency Communications Center, which is part of the county fire department. The county’s emergency dispatch center also coordinates and tracks all mutual aid involving county agencies, so all calls for help from Alameda would have gone through the center.

Some of the confusion over the Alameda County Fire Department’s role in the incident stems from sharing a name with the city, and the media’s confusion about the difference between the two entities. (Even San Lorenzo Patch, which is served by the county department, mistakenly used the department's name in a headline for a story about the incident. The story was only posted for a few minutes before it was removed.)

In an attempt to redirect public' inquiries still flowing in on Thursday afternoon, the county fire department posted a “gentle reminder” on its Facebook page, saying, “We are not the fire service provider in the City of Alameda and continue to receive numerous emails and phone calls from across the nation.”

The Alameda County Fire Department is based in San Leandro and serves the cities of San Leandro, Dublin and Newark, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, along with the unincorporated areas of the county (except for Fairview).

Olson, who is handling the city of Alameda's communications about the incident, suggested the police department’s original news release was misinterpreted, causing problems for other agencies.

“I understand we ruffled the feathers of the Alameda County Fire Department, and the Oakland Fire Department,” he said. “This was a miscommunication.”

Olson said the most important thing is to review the tragedy and make changes so such an event does not occur again.

“We’re going to review what happened, what resources were contacted, and our procedures and policies in order to make better decisions and make better use of our resources next time,” he said.

The Island’s fire department is asking the Alameda City Council for funding to revive its water-rescue program, which was suspended in 2009 because of budget cuts, Olson said.

He said the fire department would also be reviewing its coordination with other agencies.

“We need to work closely together, not only internally with the Alameda Police Department and other city agencies, but with outside agencies, as well, that we rely on for other resources," he said.