Residential fire destroys Jefferson City home
Residential fire destroys Jefferson City home
by Jasmine Lee, KOMU 8 Reporter, Lauren Donovan, KOMU 8 Digital Producer
Updated: Aug 31, 2015 1:05 AM
JEFFERSON CITY, MO
A firefighter was injured Sunday morning working to contain a fire that completely gutted a home in Jefferson City.
Jefferson City Fire Chief Jason Turner said the injured firefighter is currently being hospitalized, but is hopeful he will be released tomorrow.
The injured firefighter fell as walls and floors collapsed in the home at 1207 E. McCarty St. The firefighter's injuries were not life threatening.
Firefighters arrived on scene around 1:41 a.m. to find heavy smoke coming from the two-story home. No one was inside during the fire. It took firefighters about 30 minutes to bring the fire under control.
The cause of the fire is currently under investigation, although officials said they are not ruling out arson.
"We want to make sure we have covered all of the avenues and we studied the evidence that is in front of us," Turner said. "That way if it is an accidental fire, we can prove that. And then if it is a intentionally set fire, we have all the information we have to prosecute."
Turner also said he had trouble finding the contact information of the homeowner because they had to distinguish the previous homeowners from the current resident.
One area resident Kevin Cain said the fire went unnoticed by many neighbors until after it was out.
"It was a pretty quiet night. There was one gentleman I saw sitting over by the church, but it was pretty quiet and there was not any traffic," Cain said.
Cain lives on McCarty Street and was sitting on his porch when he saw the patrol cars passing his house.
"The smoke was a big cloud across the street," Cain said. "You could see the patrol men and the firefighters walking in to the smoke but then you could barely make out their bodies walking through."
He also mentioned that the smoke was a very strange odor and not anything like burning wood.