At 6:14 pm on Saturday evening Sweet Home Fire was dispatched to a report of a structure fire on Ridgeway Rd. The caller reported gray smoke from the roof of the home. At 6:15 pm Sweet Home Fire was dispatched to a different location for a choking. These simultaneous calls meant that there was not a full crew to staff the first-due engine company. As a result crews could not make entry until a second fire unit, staffed by two volunteers, arrived at 6:58 pm. Firefighters cannot make entry into a burning building until a minimum of 4 personnel are on scene with the exception of those incidents where it is confirmed that a victim is inside and requires rescue. In this instance, the Incident Commander, with the help of bystanders, was able to contact the occupant who was not at home and confirmed that there was no one inside. The delay in making an offensive interior attack, coupled with challenging building construction obstacles including balloon-frame construction, multiple layers of roofing, metal roofing and void spaces, made this an exceptionally challenging firefight. A second alarm was requested almost immediately due to the lack of responders available. This brought crews from Lebanon Fire, Brownsville Fire, and Halsey Fire. Even with the addition of the mutual aid resources, crews continued to be hampered by extreme heat inside the structure as a result of an inability to effectively ventilate through the multiple layers of roofing. The structure, built in 1932, had a layer of tongue and groove wood in the ceilings on each level of the 2-story house which also had a basement. This construction made the firefight extremely labor-intensive. A third alarm was requested to bring more manpower to the scene to aid firefighters who had already utilized multiple breathing air cylinders, and were several hours into the incident. At that time, the Incident Commander made the decision to transition to a defensive exterior attack for the safety of the firefighters until more crews could arrive. That exterior attack took a significant amount of heat out of the building and crews were able to transition back into an offensive tactic to overhaul the structure. This fire was also located in a rural area which was unhydranted, requiring mutual aid water tenders that were part of the second and third alarm assignments. In all there were 16 fire apparatus on scene, carrying 31 personnel. The third alarm assignment brought crews from Mohawk Valley, and medic units from both Lebanon Fire and Albany Fire were also moved up throughout the incident to cover ambulance calls in the area. There were no injuries, however 1 firefighter was evaluated by medics at the scene and did not require transport to the hospital. The home sustained heavy fire damage to the second story and water damage to the first story and basement. The fire is believed to have started in a storage area behind a knee wall on the second-story. Heavy fire damage in that area, as well as damage inherent to firefighting efforts including ventilation directly over the fire and overhaul left investigators unable to determine the cause. This fire is a reminder of how critical volunteer firefighters are to our community. We would like to encourage anyone interested in firefighting to apply for a volunteer position with their local fire department.