Out looking for an element for his upstairs stove, a Vernon homeowner’s downstairs wood stove may have caused him grief.
The man, who did not want to give his name, had been to five different places before finding the elusive element when he returned to his home in the 6400 block of Blue Jay Road just before 11:30 a.m. Tuesday, Dec. 10, and thought he saw smoke coming from the house.
“I came home and thought, ‘Funny, that looks like smoke by the door.’ I opened the door and came in and yeah, it’s going. I need to get down to try and close the (basement) door. I started to go downstairs but, no, I gotta come back out. I can’t go down there. Too much smoke,” the homeowner said.
House fire on #VernonBC’s Blue Jay Road https://t.co/mutpd0RUWP
— Vernon Morning Star (@VernonNews) December 10, 2019
“I grabbed a bucket of water that happened to be sitting in the sink that I was going to use for some plants in the shop out back and came around the side and threw the water in but it was already going right across all the floor joists,” he said. “It was gone.”
A second occupant of the house was not at home when the fire started. The man has owned the fully insured home for more than a year.
He believes the fire started in the area of the basement’s wood stove, which he confirmed was in use.
Vernon Fire Rescue Services had three trucks on-scene and a total of 14 firefighters responded to the call and suppressed the fire, containing the damage to a single structure.
The homeowner was hoping a 1930s-style Nash Lafayette vintage car he has been restoring was saved.
Just before 1 p.m., firefighters classified the fire was under control and it was extinguished, and command dismantled, shortly after 3:30 p.m.
A home is on fire in the Blue Jay Subdivision in #Vernon @VernonNews pic.twitter.com/gIr1ekrdyB
— CaitlinClow (@caitleerach) December 10, 2019
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