Putnam County Fire Department personnel were busy shuttling water from a fire hydrant to a burning mobile home this morning.
Around 5:20 a.m. Friday, Aug. 14, the fire department received a call that a trailer was on fire on the 100 block of Pineview Drive in the Crooked Creek community on Lake Sinclair. No one lived in the trailer and it was unoccupied at the time, said Putnam County Fire Chief Thomas McClain.
“A neighbor saw it on fire and gave us a call and by the time we got down there, it was mostly burned up,” McClain said. “We did put out the remnants of it, but it was a total loss.”
A fire hydrant was nearby, but because the driveway to the structure was so long, firefighters had to shuttle water back and forth to another firetruck that stayed at the burning building, McClain explained. Each of the trucks holds 1,000 gallons of water.
“So we were able to do it with one truck pumping water on the fire and two trucks shuttling water back and forth from the hydrant up on the road,” he noted.
No one was injured, and the cause of the fire remains under investigation, according to the fire chief.
On Thursday, Aug. 6, another mobile home was destroyed by fire, but a family lived in this one, located on the 100 block of Sunset Drive.
“We got the call at 10:40 a.m. and it was also called in by a neighbor,” McClain said. “So the fire was well advanced before we were notified. It, too, was a total loss.”
The family was not at home at the time of the fire; however, their pets – two small dogs and a bearded dragon – were home and did not survive.
The cause of that fire has yet to be determined, McClain said, noting it was still under investigation.
A mother, Nikki Baker, and her five children lived there and lost everything. A GoFundMe account was set up for them called, “Help The Bakers Rebuild After Fire.”