Two families lose homes to fire

SHEILA A. MATHEWS :::

Two Spalding County families lost their homes this week as a result of devastating structure fires.

The fires occurred within hours of each other Tuesday morning and required responses from both city and county fire departments.

The first call was received by the Spalding County Fire Department (SCFD) at 9:53 a.m.

“The address was 1681 Barnesville Road. Once we got there, the house was way off the road. We got there and nobody was at home. Apparently, from the information I received, the resident was at work,” said SCFD Fire Chief Kenny West. “When we arrived, the house was fully involved. We had to lay I believe 1,400 feet of three-inch hose because the hydrant was so far away from the house. We had to run up a hill and down to the house.”

West said fire personnel from three stations – Reid, the Akin District and the Cabin District – responded and remained on scene for approximately five hours.

The Barnesville Road residence sustained extremely heavy damage.

“It was pretty much totaled outside,” West said. “There were a few personal items we were able to save for them, but it was only a few and that was it.”

The second fire was reported at 11:19 a.m., and had fire crews responding to a reported fire at 1518 Zebulon Road.

“Griffin Fire went along with Spalding County. Griffin Fire-Rescue got there first because we were already on scene of the other structure fire on Barnesville Road,” West said. “It came in as an automatic mutual aid call.”

West said the Zebulon Road incident also resulted in a total loss.

“That particular house, everything was lost with that, too,” he said.

One resident of the Zebulon Road residence was home when that fire began.

“The person who was home was asleep at the time the fire started, but she wasn’t injured,” West said. “We did get WellStar ambulance service personnel to check her out as a precautionary measure. She was pretty traumatized and emotionally upset as anyone would be.”