Documentary offers new clues about deadly Rte. 9 fire

Tag : alarm cable


A Route 9 fire that claimed the lives of five people in 2000 maynot have turned fatal if the bill for the building’s firealarm system had been paid on the day before the blaze.

That’s just one of the new bits of information revealed in"The Forgotten Fire," a New England Cable Newsdocumentary set to premiere this Sunday.

NECN reporter Leslie Gaydos spent a year and a half investigatingthe cause of the fire at 200 Boylston St. that occurred on Feb. 9,2000, and uncovered a state fire marshal report that depicted abuilding with blocked or unknown fire exits and a fire alarm systemthat was near completion, but wasn’t operational due to apayment dispute.

"Had [the alarm system] been hooked up, five peoplewouldn’t have died," Gaydos said.

But more shocking than that are allegations of gross negligence bybuilding owner Sidney Kriensky.

"The most startling thing to me in this investigation was the23-minute delay for the first 911 call," Gaydos said."That is a long time."

News reports show Kriensky claiming he was attempting to put thefire out himself before calling 911. Today, Kriensky works in atrailer parked outside of the site of the fire as a ticket broker.He declined an on-camera interview.

Gaydos also confronted the former Newton building inspector,Richard O’Regan (who at the time had 200 Boylston in hisjurisdiction).

O’Regan had ignored e-mails from Gaydos, forcing her to trackhim down in a Newton parking lot last fall for a comment. Clad in aBoston Red Sox baseball hat, O’Regan admitted to Gaydos that,as an inspector, he had never gone past the first floor.

"Every time we looked into one element of the case, newinformation came up," Gaydos said. "We picked thattitle because it was a unique fire. There’s only been acouple of fires in the country in the past two decades with anoffice building fatality, where people were alive, alert at workand they died."

Currently, no criminal charges have been issued regarding the fire.Gaydos said her hope for the documentary is to change that. But shealso wants to call attention to a bill that would require olderbuildings that are 7,500 square feet or more to install a sprinklersystem. It has yet to pass.

Rep. Ruth Balser, D-Newton, first filed this bill in 2001 and hascontinued to file it in every session.

"It hasn’t passed because of the cost associated withthe installation of the sprinkler system," Balser told theTAB. "My response to that is ‘How can you put a priceon human life?’"

According to numbers provided by the Fire Chiefs Association, itwould cost $120,000 at most to install a system in a10,000-square-foot commercial building in a community with lowwater pressure.

"The Forgotten Fire" premieres this Sunday, June 22, at8 p.m. on NECN.