California: Two Firefighters Dead in Public Library Fire, Two 13-Year-Olds Arrested
Updated February 24, 2020
Recollections from library staff and part-time employees after the complete loss of the Porterville City Library due to a fire on Tuesday, February 18 showed training and quick thinking proved them to be heroes.
Updated February 21, 2020
Other Tulare County Libraries Vow To Help Fire-Ravaged Porterville Library (via Visalia Times-Delta)
Hundreds Turn Out For Remembrance of Fallen Porterville Firefighters (via Fresno Bee)
Updated February 20, 2020
A visibly distraught and fatigued Porterville Fire Chief Dave Lapere on Thursday lauded fallen firefighters Ramon “Ray” Figueroa and Patrick Jones as “consummate professionals” who died trying to ensure no one was trapped inside the city library during a raging fire.
Video: Chief Addresses Deaths of Firefighters In Porterville Library Blaze (via Fresno Bee)
End Update
From NBC News:
Two 13-year-old boys have been arrested in connection to a fire that engulfed a California city’s public library and left one firefighter dead and another missing, authorities said Wednesday.
The fire broke out at around 4 p.m. Tuesday at the library in Porterville, a city of around 60,000 in California’s Central Valley, about 70 miles southeast of Fresno, the Tulare County Sheriff’s Office said.
Read the Complete Article
See Also: Porterville Public Library on Facebook
Includes Statement from California State Library
Filed under: Libraries, News, Public Libraries

About Gary Price
Gary Price (gprice@gmail.com) is a librarian, writer, consultant, and frequent conference speaker based in the Washington D.C. metro area. He earned his MLIS degree from Wayne State University in Detroit. Price has won several awards including the SLA Innovations in Technology Award and Alumnus of the Year from the Wayne St. University Library and Information Science Program. From 2006-2009 he was Director of Online Information Services at Ask.com. Gary is also the co-founder of infoDJ an innovation research consultancy supporting corporate product and business model teams with just-in-time fact and insight finding.