A fire that destroyed a home early Monday morning in rural Clark County was caused by a heat lamp placed too close to a couch.
Clark County Deputy Fire Marshal Caleb Barnes said the home in the 19700 block of Northeast Erion Road was a “complete and total loss.”
Firefighters were dispatched at 6:08 a.m., and the first fire engine arrived in about seven minutes. Its crew saw flames extending from the front of the two-story house, Fire District 3 Battalion Chief Dave O’Brian told The Columbian.
The fire reached through the roof of the home within minutes.
There were reports of someone trapped inside the burning building, but firefighters determined a woman, the home’s only occupant, had escaped out the back. She got stuck in some thorny bushes behind the house, but she was not seriously injured.
A firefighter threw the woman over their shoulder and carried her out of the bushes, because she had cut her feet, Barnes said.
The fire appeared to have started on a covered front porch, which Barnes described as a kind of large entryway with a roof extended overhead. There was a small couch on the porch placed there for a stray cat, and the heat lamp was next to it, according to the deputy fire marshal.
The lamp may have been left on for more than a week, Barnes said.
“The fire started on the couch so it’s more likely than not that it was the heat lamp,” he said.
The woman’s dogs alerted her to the fire. She opened the front door to “a bunch of flames” so she ran out the back, Barnes said. Several dogs were not as fortunate.
The fire department initially reported that three dogs died in the fire, but Barnes said four dogs and one puppy died. It is possible two cats also died, he said.
Two dogs escaped the house; one suffered burns to its nose.
Barnes said he was unable to search all of the remnants of the house because it was dangerous.
The financial loss from the fire is estimated to be about $285,000.
