Fire destroys Henry Clay Twp. house
No one was injured Friday when a house along Beaver Creek Road in Henry Clay Township was destroyed by fire around 10 a.m., Markleysburg fire officials said. According to Markleysburg Fire Chief Ed Hoffman, firefighters battled frigid conditions and snow-covered roads to fight the blaze at 686 Beaver Creek Road, which was fully ablaze when crews first arrived.
Hoffman said that no one was injured and that the cause of the fire is under investigation.
John Tambellini, who was renting the house from his cousin Jackie Mitchell, said he was not home when the fire began, but he had a bad feeling when he saw the fire trucks and smoke when he was returning from a trip to the store.
“As soon as I saw the fire trucks, I thought, ‘God, don’t be,'” Tambellini said. “It was down to the ground when we got there. It just went up like a tinder box.”
He said that he had left the house for about 30 minutes to go to the store.
He said that before he left, he put a “torpedo” heater under the house to thaw frozen pipes. He noted that the pipes had been freezing in the recent cold weather and that the landlord had instructed him to thaw them with the heater. Tambellini said he thought the heater probably was what caused the blaze.
An employee of Gorley’s Restaurant in Markleysburg, Tambellini said he lost nearly everything in the fire.
“With the exception of some clothes, a few televisions and a laptop computer, it is all gone,” he said, but he was just happy that no one was hurt.
Tambellini said that he did not have renter’s insurance on the contents of his home and that for now he would live with his brother, who also lives along Beaver Creek Road.
According to Hoffman, the road conditions, which were poor throughout Fayette County due to snowy conditions, did not hinder the firefighters’ efforts to get to the home.
“The township did a real good job of keeping these roads clear,” Hoffman said.
According to Fayette County 911, firefighters from Farmington, Ohiopyle, Springfield Township and Somerset County, as well as those from across the state line in Preston County and Garrett County, Md., assisted with the blaze.