Yankees’ ballpark fire scare brings back deadly college memory
· Yahoo Sports
TAMPA, Fla. — Yankees manager Aaron Boone was so deep in thought during his post-game interview Friday night that he ignored a fire alarm sounding and a red flashing light directly in his sightline.
Sitting at a podium in the team meeting room at Steinbrenner Field after a 3-1 victory over the Orioles, Boone also talked over a computer-generated message blaring from a speaker:
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Can I have your attention please. There has been a fire emergency reported in the building. Please evacuate to the nearest exit.
With about a dozen reporters facing Boone in the first two rows of seats, he went on for another 40 seconds answering a question about outfielder Jasson Dominguez’s Friday demotion to Triple-A before stopping.
The computer message started up again:
Can I have your attention please …
“Is there a fire?” I asked.
No, we found out a few minutes later, but no one knew what was going on at the time.
The interview abruptly ended.
Then while Boone, reporters and media relations staffers were exiting the clubhouse-level room, a stadium security official appeared and issued a three-word order:
“Evacuate the building.”
Not smelling any smoke, I asked if we could head up to the third floor so we could get our laptops. Most of us still had some writing to do.
“No, leave the building now and we’ll tell you when you can go back in,” we were told.
This was around 9:05 p.m., about 15 minutes after Yankees reliever Paul Blackburn struck out Anderson De Los Santos to end a game that was highlighted by starting pitcher Luis Gil’s five shutout innings of one-hit ball with seven strikeouts.
Hundreds from a crowd of 9,989 still were making its way out of the ballpark when the evacuation was ordered.
Standing inside the front doors of the executive office entrance, I noticed a group of fans exiting a nearby elevator.
We figured they were coming from the suites on the third floor. Nobody was panicking, so I asked a stadium worker standing nearby if we could head back up to the press box and quickly pack our stuff.
“If you want,” he said.
I took that as a green light.
Waiting for the elevator, I was wondering if I made a bad decision … one similar to what I almost did when I was just out of college and working part-time sports writer at the Greensburg (Pa.) Tribune-Review in the summer of 1986.
A month or two after graduating from the University of Pittsburgh, I was back on campus for a Sunday night of partying with a college buddy who was taking summer classes. As I was about to fall asleep on the sofa of his second-floor apartment around 3 in the morning, I heard a commotion outside the front door. When it kept up for a few minutes, I opened the door and saw flames.
I ran into the two bedrooms to wake everyone up, then quickly packed my small travel bag and ran down a flight of stairs to safety.
Standing outside with a couple dozen college students, I couldn’t find my contacts. The guy standing next to me was a stranger in his underwear who fled from a third-floor apartment. He told me that he was going back in to get a pair of pants. I said I wanted to go back in and look for my contacts.
I went back in, then turned around halfway up the stairs with a wall of flames in my path. That decision probably saved my life because my contacts were in my travel bag.
The other guy went around the flames and back up to his apartment ... and never came back out.
I’ll never forget seeing the young man being carried out in a body bag around dusk.
I thought of that scary night after Friday’s Yankees game while waiting for an elevator.
We returned to the third floor, entered the press box and noticed a couple reporters typing with headphones on. They were oblivious to what was going on.
We grabbed our laptops, packed up and hustled out of the press box.
“You can’t take the elevators,” a security official yelled. “Go through the suites and take the stairs down. There’s stairs in both directions.”
I headed to the right and walked through a door into the suites. There, I was met by the stadium maintenance manager, who was walking my way.
I asked if there’s a fire.
“There’s no fire,” he said. “Come with me. You can use the elevator. No one will say anything to you because you’re with me.”
I headed to the elevator, then road down with other reporters and headed outside.
Walking to the parking lot, I heard the siren from a fire truck in the area, but it never went to the ballpark.
Turns out someone drove into a power pole a few blocks from Steinbrenner Field, knocking out power momentarily at the ballpark ... and setting off the alarm.
Thankfully, this was just a little scare.
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