BLOUNTSTOWN STRUCTURE FIRE
by Teresa Eubanks, CLJNews.com
BLOUNTSTOWN, FL – An Easter Sunday night blaze gutted an abandoned home located on 13th Street in Blountstown.
More than 20 firefighters from West Side, Blountstown, Nettle Ridge and Magnolia Fire Departments responded to the call that evening, leaving their suppers on the table. They arrived to find the woodframe structure fully involved.
“The fire was so hot that we couldn’t even park the truck in front of it. It would have blasted the paint,” said West Side VFD Chief Doug Harrell. “We could see the fire well before we turned off SR 20. It was blazing.”
“We threw a lot of water on it really quickly,” said Blountstown Fire Chief Ben Hall. “We are fortunate to have fire hydrants in the area.”
The structure was located about a half mile outside the city limits. “You could see the glow of the blaze from Hentz Avenue,” Hall said. The building was already fully involved when firefighters were paged out.
The cause was undetermined but local drug users were known to gather at the site. There was no electricity connected to the house.