Upon their arrival, crews found smoke and flames coming from the residence. All residents had safely evacuated the building. Fire had spread from the wood stove into the wall behind the fireplace of the log home. Crews worked for approximately two hours to expose all of the smoldering areas in the walls.

The structure experienced extensive fire damage in one room and smoke damage throughout the entire structure.

Damage to the home its contents is currently estimated at $15,000.

According to the woman who was house sitting, she had started a fire in a free- standing wood stove that was vented into the nearby fireplace and noticed the fireplace was producing an unusual amount of smoke.

She then extinguished the fire in the wood stove and found that the smoke continued to persist in the fireplace. She could hear the fire in the wall of the home and proceeded to evacuate herself and her pets and call 9-1-1 from her cell phone outside the home.

The fireplace had not been cleaned and a large amount of creasilt had built up in the chimney. This allowed the bricks to get hot enough to catch the external log construction on fire.