Abandoned House Fire May, 9th, 2020

Saturday evening, May 9th, 2020, Sullivan Fire Department was dispatched to a well involved first alarm residential structure fire around 9 pm, located on the North Service Road a quarter mile past the Sullivan Vetrinary Clinic. Call came in as flames showing at the rear of the house, called in by passing motorists on I-44…when I arrived, it was fully involved front to back and through the roof. Saint Clair and Bourbon Fire Districts were dispatched for the assist as well. 

Fires 2020-0509 Residential Structure Fire N Serv Rd E of Vet Hospital AVI 05

…there were live power lines down on the highway side at the back of the house, Crawford Electric had a crew on the way to disarm them and fire crews gave a wide berth while fighting the fire from both sides of the house…I told Chief Eric, that at one time, this had been quite a pretty home and sitting off the service road in a field, I am sure the residents saw a lot of wildlife there….it had been vacant for some time tho…

…crews deployed a larger handline to the south side of the house and Beau Kick operated the nozzle on it briefly from there…

Fires 2020=0509 2nd Video Residential Structure Fire N Serv Rd E of Vet Hosp AVI 16

…I believe the intent was to bounce the stream off the roof/ceiling down into the flames below, they were yelling at him that there was no roof in which to do that, so he shut the line down for a while, and then someone started spraying it again….

Fires 2020-0509 3rd Video Resid Structure Fire N Serv Rd E of Vet Hosp

I shot quite a few videos of this fire as it was tough to move around either side with high weeds and trees and live power line hazards as well…I always do my best to stay out of their way, as well…

Fires 2020-0509 4th Video Resid Structure Fire N Serv Rd E of Vet Hosp AVI 34

Firefighters were having a lot of trouble entering the structure from the front entryway due to the amount of roofing that fell in before their arrival…they decided to cut their way in…

Fires 2020-0509 Sixth Video Resid Structure Fire N Serv Rd E of Vet Hosp AVI 49

…the video above shows Bourbon firefighters arriving to help….and the next video shows how they decided to cut the main support beam above the front wall and then pull it down to get inside and fully extinguish the fire….

Fires 2020-0509 7th Video Resid Structure Fire N Serv Rd E of Vet Hosp AVI 50

…and after that it was a matter of wading in and mopping up…

..I am sure firefighters were on scene for some time after, making sure it was completely out before leaving the scene…Saint Clair responded a pumper with manpower and their Super Tanker as well.