Dear Neighbor,
Last Thursday evening, on December 26th, there was an emergency at Crozer-Chester Medical Center in Upland when a fire in the Mechanical Room led to the evacuation of 33 patients to nearby hospitals. Crozer staff, first responders and Delaware County’s emergency response and hazmat teams responded quickly and it’s a miracle that no one was injured.
According to Crozer CEO Tony Esposito: “The incident was triggered by a ruptured pipe that caused flooding in the hospital’s Mechanical Room located near the loading dock. The flooding reached the transformer and power panels in the electrical room causing multiple ARC shorts and terminating power to affected areas. The Upland Fire Company and Chester Bureau of Fire were immediately dispatched, and a Mass Casualty Incident was initiated which brought multiple ambulances from across the county to begin patient evacuations. While the smoke was contained mostly to the north side of the building, the situation required the immediate evacuation of Critical Care patients. The Delaware County Hazmat team monitored the air quality in all patient areas of the hospital.”
There was a second incident at Crozer-Chester yesterday, on December 30. According to Upland Borough Fire Marshall Dan Smith: “This morning during a switch over from internal emergency generators to an external generator by an electrical contractor, there was an arc short of a transformer in the same mechanical room as a previous emergency. The generator caused a small fire of itself that caused a smoke condition in the boiler room with minor extension of smoke and odor in the Hospital. Crews worked to make sure all power was secured to the room of origin and after multiple attempts to extinguish with dry chemical extinguishers it was decided to put (1) one 1 ¾ hand line in service to extinguish the burning transformer. Crews worked on smoke removal and turned the operation back over to the hospital contractors to start the repairs. No patients needed to be evacuated as well as no injuries were reported.”
I have stayed in close contact with Upland Borough’s Fire Marshall, Dan Smith, as well as Crozer’s CEO, Tony Esposito. As of yesterday, all units at Crozer-Chester Hospital have been reopened except for STEMI (cardiac catheterization) and Labor and Delivery.
Please join me in thanking the Crozer staff and emergency responders who acted fast and prevented what could have been a much worse outcome. I am grateful for their tireless commitment to our community.