House ‘Reduced To Rubble’ After 36-Hour Fire In Holladay
Aug 5, 2019, 7:04 AM | Updated: 6:33 pm
HOLLADAY, Utah – A devastating fire that burned for more than a day has completely destroyed a 25,000-square-foot home, fire officials said.
The fire broke out Saturday night in the area of 6085 South and 2900 East.
Unified Fire Authority spokesman Matthew McFarland said crews have been at the scene for more than 36 hours, with two ladders spraying 300 gallons of water per minute each.
“When it initially caught fire, we had crews attempt to go in three times,” he said. “Each time they encountered dangers that made it unsafe for even firefighters to be in there.”
Here’s a look at the aftermath of the massive house fire in Holladay that has been burning since Saturday. Details on efforts today @KSL5TV and the latest at noon. pic.twitter.com/pcdbsLIDqF
— Felicia Martinez (@FeliciaNews) August 5, 2019
Nobody was inside when the fire started, authorities said, and the family hadn’t been home for about five hours. This gave the fire time to grow.
“Fire inside a modern structure doubles in size every minute once it’s established,” McFarland said. “This was a really large home. It was well involved once we got there.”
He said firefighters have been doing an external defensive attack on the house, along with an 8,000-square-foot garage.
Windy overnight weather also caused additional flareups. Crews were stationed throughout adjacent properties to ensure embers that were blown by the wind didn’t start any additional fires.
“We’re not going to leave here until we’re 100% certain there’s no heat there at all,” McFarland said. “So if there’s another wind event, like we had last night, it couldn’t possibly throw embers into the surrounding brush.”
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The home itself is a total loss.
“Most of the fuel has been reduced to rubble, unfortunately, at this time,” McFarland said.
He added that crews were able to get “a lot” of the homeowner’s vehicles out of the garage.
“Obviously the homeowners suffered a devastating loss,” McFarland said. “Everything they own minus what we could get out of that large garage is a total loss. We feel for them.”
Officials said crews will bring in a crane Monday morning to help knock remaining rubble down so investigators can begin determining the cause of the fire.
“There’s no reason to believe there’s any malicious intent with this,” McFarland said. “(Investigators) still believe it was likely accidental in nature.”
“Actual cause is going to be a long time coming, I believe,” he added.
There’s no estimate on damages yet. There were no injuries reported.
