Fire destroys trailer home in Kearney
UPDATE: The Nebraska Fire Marshal's office determined the cause of the fire was an unattended candle.
KEARNEY, Neb. — A Kearney family is displaced after a trailer fire destroyed a home.
The fire department responded to the blaze at East Lawn Trailer Park just before 11:30 Thursday morning. Chief Aaron Jameson says flames had taken over the trailer by the time firefighters arrived.
“Upon arrival, crews found heavy smoke, heavy fire conditions, fire coming out of multiple sides of the building," Jameson said. "We knew we had a pretty good fire at that point.”
Don and Kim Frost lives across the street from the trailer that burned. They say the fire department’s quick response prevented further damage.
“I looked, I see the flames, the flames are so high they almost hit the next trailer over," Don Frost said. "I thought for sure that was going to go up. But if they didn’t get here when they did, that would have been gone too.”
Preventing the fire from spreading was a priority for fire crews.
“We put some exterior application of water onto this trailer over here just to ensure that it was cool," Jameson said. "Then we sent a crew into this structure just to check it with a thermal imaging camera and make sure that we didn’t have any radiant heat penetration into the structure.”
Nobody was home when the fire started. A neighbor rushed in and saved one dog but couldn’t get to a second dog in time.
It all hit too close to home for neighbors whose homes are packed in close together in the high-density trailer park.
“It is terrifying when it’s right across," Kim Frost said. "We’re literally maybe 15 steps away from where all of this went down. It could have gone any direction. It’s scary.”
The narrow streets and lack of fire hydrants make responding to these calls challenging for firefighters.
“Super tough conditions," Jameson said. "We burned through that first tank of water pretty quick on the engine, but the tanker was pulling up as soon as we were running out, so we made a quick connection, refilled the truck and kept going.”
The owner’s parents live nearby. Him and his daughter will stay there in the short-term.
The cause of the fire is under investigation.