Does nothing? The firetrucks are already there! Look at the frikkin picture! What's he/she supposed to do? Dumb title, not funny.

KenK

@remps: it was probably caused by an overheating 360

Naoki

@prsiii: Lots of places have the hydrants on one side of blocks, thats actually very commain. Many large cities have one hydrant per block or per every other block depending on the blocks length and some dont even have any once you leave out of city limits and into the suburbs

utube2007

All I can say is.....wtf, theres like only 1 fire hydrant in that whole neighborhood or something.....

KuroiNaito

Wrong: Check the overhead map, you'll see the blue Streetview coverage overlay terminate at the back of the firetruck, Google then drove around the block the long way. There's a gap in coverage the length of three firetrucks.

What I find more amusing is that the closest fire hydrant is at the opposite end of the block, what a crappy development where the houses look good, but the infrastructure is sub-par. My bet: Foreclosure arson.

prsiii

C'mon misleading headline. The fire department is ALREADY there.

SuperMacGuy

That's hot!

remps

If you go to the link, you can step around the house, down the street, in both directions. Evidently, the Google Maps vehicle drove around the fire trucks and even caught some people standing around watching the fire. Pretty amusing!

toxictv

First of all, this house, if entered into StreetView, has the potential to become a real life, honest-to-goodness, Springfield Tire Fire (now in its 17th Season!!!). I want this house in StreetView.

Second, I think that Mister Softee trucks should always be present on Microsoft's campus. Just driving around, selling ice cream, and blasting that infernal melody.

OMG! Ponies! Wicked Awesome Margaritas

@Toshie: Clearly they failed on the funny. I agree, headline is stupid. Full of fail.

jenfraiz

And WTF is up with all the harsh comments? It's supposed to be a funny headline not an indictment.

Toshie

@DisposableInterloper: Care to elaborate?

Toshie

What's interesting is just about diagonal to the burning house is a new timber structure. Looks like these houses are pretty new maybe?

vee-media

Terrible headline, guys.

imaria

How terrible of Google not to do anything! Why should they let the firefighters do all the work! They should stop their job, get out the car and put that fucking fire out NOW! FOr Shame Google FOR SHAME

LittleBigPlaneteer

No worse than the bystanders taking photos. At least the Google people were doing their job. But seriously, what should they have done? Not like the fire department was going to let them just control the hose or run into the building. Horrible, misleading title, giz.

geowrian

Am I the only one that gets an overwhelming feeling of schadenfreude every time I hear about something like this happening in the South?

DisposableInterloper

A quick drive around the block, on Turtle Creek Dr, and there appears to be a volunteer firefighter flipping the Street View car the bird.

Theophilus P. Wildebeeste

That house could have been saved, if the Google StreetView car hadn't stopped on the hose, TWICE.

Allegedly. ;)

Theophilus P. Wildebeeste

Ssssssmokin'!

Sorry, had too.

I also think the headline is misleading, the fire trucks are already there. Give google a break!

jblaismacfan

@utube2007: 'Forclosure arson'. Good one. If this was a diner intead of a house it would be called Greek lightning.

Jrsy

I wonder if google is ever going to add sound clips to the images in streetview. It wouldn't be that hard to have it play a clip starting 5-10 seconds before the image was taken and ending 5-10 seconds after.

Gann

Apparently, Apple is getting ready to offer a competing service, so Gizmodo is doing their usual unbiased reporting.

snathanb

@OMG! Ponies! Wicked Awesome Margaritas: "Yeah, you'd be grumpy too if your house was on fire and gawked at by a bunch of slack-jawed yokels!"

Hey Maw, that there horseless carriage is a takin pictures!

+ Watch video

Git Em SteveDave displays attention-grabbing vanity

Google announces it's new venture. Goto fire.google.com, police.google.com, or EMS.google.com, and Google will dispatch employees or subcontractors to you're location to handle all of your emergency needs.

Git Em SteveDave displays attention-grabbing vanity

Lay off the criticism of the title. It's funny. The StreetView car drove by and took pictures of a burning house and then Google uploaded it to the internet. Google exercised poor judgment and as such, gets the Snark. What should Google have done?

Not uploaded the picture.

Also, congratulations to Disposable Interloper for demonstrating the efficiency and flaw of the Disemvoweler. Does the computer have an algorithm to determine how often "Y" is remove from the post or is it preset at 50% representation of "sometimes".

OMG! Ponies! Wicked Awesome Margaritas

@DisposableInterloper:

yes you are.

funkytooth

@Tsh:
Wll, myb 'm jst n sshl, bt whnvr s hss lvld, fldd, r brnd n th Sth, cn't hlp bt mgn strtypcl nbrd hllblly wtchng th pnncl f thr drms crshng dwn. Smhw, tht jst mks m lgh.

DisposableInterloper

I wonder if this was playing on the Streetview cars stereo.

+ Watch video

Now THAT would be ironic, dont'cha think?

Git Em SteveDave displays attention-grabbing vanity

looks like the fire started in the garage, must be the dodgy electrics in those US cars ;-)

ecobore

@prsiii: @KuroiNaito: @utube2007: I don't know why the FD isn't using them, but there are 2 fire hydrants much closer than the one they choose. There's one on the corner of Eagle Point and Antler Way, and another on the Southwest corner of Eagle Point, next to the kids giving the StreetView car a funny look.

LastVigilante

Maybe his iPhone got hot and melted, and then set his house on fire.

Con Seannery

Have we determined that this wasn't the work of the ELF? This is one big development and there's a house still under construction around the block. Maybe this is a warning to developers...

OMG! Ponies! Wicked Awesome Margaritas

@toxictv: As said, you're wrong. How closely did you look? The GCar pulls up to the back of the firetruck, then doens't go further (the truck was in the middle of the street, dude).

James

@DisposableInterloper: No 'myb' about it...

Toshie

Calm down people, it's a joke. Not everything has to be a literal interpretation, I thought the headline was great.

atomx

Do you know what would be funny? Google using the Ford Focus with Microsoft SYNC.

Blue387

@DisposableInterloper: For future reference: this is the sort of comment that gets "disemvowelled" prior to banning. Eloquent, grammatical, not bashing other commenters, not bashing the article. But: negative in tone and slightly political.

Wonderful.

Cultivar

@Toshie: Wow! Amazing. I don't think anybody gets the joke here.

bucho54

Yea, google guys should have stopped to help put out the fire with their stream of justice.

BiZarRroBALlmeR

Kudos for the headline edit, guys. I mean that.

imaria

I can't believe Google just drove by without helping. Microsoft employees would never have done that.

quikboy

Does it make me a bad person if I find this amusing?

meirelle

what was the original headline? was it something along the lines of "Google pranks Microsoft guy, captures it for Streetview without FD knowing"

rer89

Uh, there's already fire trucks there, and I have good word from inside sources that Google Fire Putter Outter is still in early, early alpha, and in no way ready for public testing.

chartier

The firefighters are already present, they can continue filming.

m-p{3}

Ah, never mind. Only the picture linked was removed. Others are still there. You know, if you are directly beside the house on Eagle Point Drive and face the opposite direction (West), doesn't it look like the house on the other side of the fence is also on fire? I can see a lot of smoke.

Harkonian

The picture has been removed from google street view.

Harkonian

LOL at all the commenters who sound like they are crazy, since the headline has been changed.

misterwho

Why did they remove it? If you go down the block a bit you can still see it. What are they going to do erase the whole block and wait until the house is rebuilt before re shooting?

GadgetGhurl

@GadgetGhurl: & @Harkonian: Although it says the image has been removed, I moved the camera position when it said that and the picture of the house is still there.

smokindenali

What do you mean 'does nothing' they took a picture, that was something right?
When the people want to relive what is possibly the worst day of their lives they can hop onto Google maps and bam, Google comes to through for them!

lstar28