An antique firetruck typically parked inside the building at the Denver Firefighters Museum caught fire this morning after returning from a funeral service.

The truck has heavy engine damage, but the museum, which contains a vast archive of photography and equipment did not burn. There were about 30 visitors in the museum at the time of the incident.

The 1953 Seagrave engine has been used for public relations events and as a hearse service for former firefighters since 1999. Dan Farley, a retired Denver Fire engineer, was driving the truck and had just returned from a morning funeral service. He had parked it in front of the museum on Tremont Place in order to hose it down and clean it up when the engine backfired at approximately 10:30 a.m.

“The backfire was a real throaty backfire. I expected the worst when I saw the heat rise from the hood,” Farley said.

Farley and the museum staff called the Denver Fire Department while they scrambled to find anything, including three fire extinguishers, to put out the flames.

“I’ve put a lot of fires out in my day and I couldn’t save it,” Farley said. “By a stroke of luck the heat burst the radiator hose, which put out most of the fire.”

Denver Fire Engines 1 and 6 responded to the scene and extinguished the remaining embers.

Farley and the museum staff were left devastated by the event.

“That was my very first rig when I came on the job in1977,” Farley said, with tears welling in his eyes. “It’s hard. I’ve been its chief cook and bottle washer for a long time. I have a huge financial and emotional investment in it.”

The rig is privately owned by the museum, which is a small nonprofit.

“Donations are going to be really important to us,” said Kelly Lynch, education and outreach coordinator for the museum. “We will be putting up a site on our website to help restore it.”

“It’s devastating,” Farley said. “It’s a hard economy for everyone, and this is going to be a $100,000 fix.”