The community acted quickly to contain damage from a raging house fire 10 miles east of Dickens on Saturday.
According to Dickens Volunteer Fire Department chief Will Humphreys, the owner of a home near the Croton Creek road and the East Afton cutoff was out of town when a neighbor saw smoke billowing from the house and called the sheriff’s department. The fire departments were paged at around 4 p.m. Saturday.
“When we got there, we had to cut the lock,” Humphreys said. “The neighbor had turned off the propane and South Plains had already turned off the electricity.”
Humphreys said 15 firefighters from the Dickens, Spur and McAdoo units arrived on the scene and immediately began to save what they could. One travel trailer had already burned to the shell, but they were able to save a second one. They were also able to rescue a gooseneck trailer with a wood load, by hooking a pickup to it and pulling it away.
The Dickens fire chief said the house was already about half destroyed when firefighters came upon the scene. Humphreys guessed that the house was a three bedroom, two bath house, and he was under the impression that the new owners were doing small remodeling. He also said that it appeared that the home was a second home for the absent owner.
There were no animals on hand and no injuries.
It took firefighters three hours to contain the flames.
At this point no one is quite sure how the fire started. “In a situation like this,” Humphreys said, “we always assume it’s an electrical issue.”
Reports via police scanner had indicated that ammunition was inside the house and was exploding during the blaze, but no one was injured. “In this part of the country, that’s pretty typical,” Humphreys said.
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