Helena home catches fire

A home is severely damaged after a fire started outside the residence early this morning.

A home receives irreparable damage after it caught fire early Thursday morning.  Helena Fire Marshal, Craig Trapp, says ashes from a wood burning appliance started the blaze.

Trapp says, "They were cleaning out their wood burning appliance and they dropped the ashes outside."

Trapp says the fire spread to the structure, quickly engulfing the home in flames.

Trapp says, "The fire began outside and went to the inside up through walls and through floors and ceiling area which made the fire pretty difficult to extinguish."

Trapp says this blaze was one of the worse structure fires he has seen in a while.  He says the amount of storage inside the home helped fuel the flames and made the fire very dangerous.

Trapp says, "There was a heavy amount of fire so we had to start on the exterior until we felt it was safe to send people back inside to do a total mop up."

Trapp says the home is a total loss.

Trapp says, "It suffered severe smoke damages inside and out so I don’t know what they’re really going to be able to recover."

The family is receiving aid from the American Red Cross Disaster Services.  No one was injured in the fire.  Trapp says there were fire alarms installed in the home.  He says the family was sleeping when the fire started and the smoke detectors helped to quickly signal there was something wrong.

Story by Kelley Smith, Beartooth NBC.
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