Features

Disaster Averted 

An 11:19 p.m. call on June 6 brought firefighters rushing to an apartment building at 2218 Seventh St., where they arrived to find a fire in the basement. 

Deputy Fire Chief David Orth said the flames, which started when objects piled on top of an electrical cord caused the wires to spark, caused an estimated $15,000 in damage. 

Things could have been a lot worse, because a plastic gasoline container kept for a lawnmower spilled its contents after the plastic melted from the heat. 

Fortunately, firefighters arrived before the gas could ignite. 

As it was, the fumes from the spoilt fuel forced the evacuation of the building, and the Red Cross provided Day’s Inn rooms for the six tenants who were displaced for the night until the fumes has dispersed, Orth said. 

Range fire 

Firefighters were called to a home at 1639 Fairview St. at 2 p.m. Sunday, but when they arrived they discovered that the occupants had already extinguished a kitchen fire that was confined to the area of the range and its hood. 

Orth estimated the damage at $5,000.›