ARBORFIELD — Nobody was injured as a structure fire damaged a home in Arborfield.
The Arborfield Fire Department responded to a house fire at 9:42 a.m. on Aug. 20 after a bystander called emergency services.
“There were no pets and nobody in the home during the fire. What happened was the lady left for work and she’s not sure what happened,” said Chet Edwards, Arborfield’s fire chief.
After making sure nobody was home, the department focused on keeping the fire to a minimum.
“The fire seemed to be in the basement,” Edwards said. “The fire was virtually kept to the basement but was damaging to the structure of the house.”
Firefighters went into the building to hose it down with water, while others attacked the fire through the basement windows.
“There is foam and whatnot you can use that’s definitely a helper but in this circumstance it was just a water source is the best way. We were actually hooked up into the town fire hydrant in town.”
The Zenon Park Fire Department assisted Arborfield in the call.
Edwards said typically in a structure fire, the basement is the only part of the home that can be saved, but the team managed to contain the blaze on this call.
He said that it’s not very often that a fire starts in the basement, but when it does it is usually too late by the time anybody notices.
“We got the fire out. If you look at the home right now, outside of the windows that were taken out and whatnot, that’s about the only thing you can tell that there was a structure fire. It never made it into the upper floor or the roof. We managed to put the fire out.”
Garett Ralph, Arborfield’s deputy fire chief, was in charge of the scene.
“A big thank you to the local volunteers and also the local farmers who always have an abundance of water that’s just right there at our fingertips at a phone call,” Edwards said. “And a thank you to Zenon Park Fire Department.”
