Billings News

Snowy side streets may have led to mail truck fire

Posted: Nov 30, 2010 4:34 PM by Angela Douglas - Q2 News
Updated: Dec 1, 2010 3:13 PM

BILLINGS - A melted cab and charred interior is all that remains of a mail truck that caught fire in Billings on Monday.

"It hasn't happened since I've been at the postal service, so it's been at least 15 years," says Big Sky District Marketing Director, Sally Tuomi. "I know the carrier is a 37+ year carrier and he's never had it happened either. Very, very unusual."

Now, the 300 to 400 parcels of mail are being aired out and are expected to be delivered in the next couple days.

"Once it's dry we will go ahead and mail it to the recipient, it will go in mail bags with a letter explaining exactly what had happened and an apology for the delay," explains Tuomi.

The mail carrier, Jesse Slevira, got away without any injuries and even took time to unload as much mail as possible before the blaze consumed his truck. Business mail, like advertisements, suffered the most damage.

"The carrier did a great job getting all the mail out of the truck that he could," Tuomi says. "We had very little of it completely lost that we can tell."

Slevira was halfway through his route when the fire sparked around 1 p.m. on White Circle in the Billings Heights.

"There obviously was a mechanical failure of some type that caused the fire," says Tuomi. "They're thinking it probably was the transmission but that is still under investigation."

Deep snow on secondary streets has caused many mail carriers to get stuck, but that's not the biggest problem that comes from the difficult road conditions.

"The wear and the tear on the transmissions is very hard on our vehicles because we're trying to go through all of the areas where there isn't any driving yet," explains Tuomi.

Snow or no snow, the mail rarely stops. You can expect your letters in the next day or two, but there were three to four packages that were burned, one appears to have contained baby clothes.

"Anyone that was expecting packages that didn't arrive, we will have those here," Tuomi says.
"The ones that are unidentifiable."

The Billings Fire Department responded to the fire and had the flames extinguished quickly.

The mail applies to the 900 and up block of Nutter, along with the surrounding streets of Erickson, Crystal Lake, Butterfly Lane, Lonesome Pine, Claim Jumper, Hardrock, Mirror Lake, Shamrock Ct., Lilly Valley, Aster, Jonquil, Goldpan, Sapphire, Nugget, Calendula and Grubstake.

Billings Heights residents who think they could have had mail lost in the fire, can contact the Postal Service District Consumer Affairs department in Billings at 657-5776 with any questions.

Topics: U.S Postal Service, Mail Truck, Snow Removal, Snow Plows, Billings, KTVQ, Q2 News, Angela Douglas