By Krystal Smalley and Gary Ogle
ksmalely@wbcowqel.com; gogle@wbcowqel.com
The rash of fires in the area continued Thursday when the Bucyrus Fire Department responded to five calls at two residential properties in town.
It didn’t take long for things to escalate.
The Bucyrus Fire Department had been dispatched to a fire at 808 S. Sandusky Ave. Thursday afternoon when, a few moments later, another call came in concerning a fire at 423 W. Warren St. Both calls came through the 9-1-1 dispatch system from the Crawford County Sheriff’s Office just minutes before 2 p.m.
Captain Gordon Grove had responded to the Sandusky Avenue fire when he received word of the second structural fire at W. Warren St. Grove said they paged all personnel to respond to the fires.
While at the Sandusky Avenue fire, Grove said he entered the home to see the owner coming down the stairs. The fire captain believed the man had been trying to fight the fire when the fire department arrived. The owner was taken to a waiting ambulance and treated for smoke inhalation.
At that time additional help was requested at the Warren Street fire as heavy smoke billowed out and flames were visible. Grove said he and his team performed a knock down of the fire at Sandusky Avenue before heading to the Warren Street fire.
Bucyrus received mutual aid from the Galion Fire Department and two off-duty firefighters were called in to assist.
Once the fire had been handled on Warren Street, Grove said they had to return to Sandusky Avenue. Though they had been able to contain most of the damage when they first arrived, Gordon said the fire went into the overhang and some flames were showing. Most of the damage was sustained on the back side of the house and into the attic.
According to Grove, his department answered a total of five calls Thursday for the home homes, one at the Sandusky Avenue residence and twice for the Warren Street house.
“We’re kind of looking closely at the two rekindles at Warren Street,” Grove said. “They happened awful quickly.
The two house fires and rekindles were the latest in a rash of fires this fall throughout Crawford County. Just this week two young children and their father died in a mobile home fire in Galion.
On Oct. 3 a father and his young daughter perished in a house fire in Tiro. One day earlier two houses caught fire in Bucyrus.
More recently there was a fire that destroyed a duplex in Galion. That is in addition to multiple barn fires and a field fire in the county. In September the Eichhorn sawmill burned and a mobile home in Bucyrus was also destroyed.
A vacant home on East Rensselaer Street was also burned out in September. That fire is being blamed on arson. Another vacant home on Maple Street in Bucyrus caught fire a week earlier.