Barn fire highlights struggles with water
Staff writer
A structure fire at a homestead Sunday highlighted what it is like to fight fires in rural areas.
Around 5 a.m. Sunday, the Lincolnville firefighters were dispatched to a barn fire at 2921 Sunflower Rd.
Upon their arrival, they found the barn fully and had already burned almost to the ground. That barn was considered a total loss.
A second barn with multiple fires on the roof was able to be saved.
No one was injured and the official cause of the fire is undetermined.
Other responding departments included Lost Springs, Tampa Marion, and Herington fire departments.
Lincolnville was the lead department.
“On a structure fire, we have automatic aid with other departments,” Lincolnville Fire Chief Lester Kaiser said.
A fire this remote brought a regular challenge that rural fire departments and districts face, In many rural areas, water is an issue as there are no hydrants.
“We will utilize a water shuttle system with tenders,” Kaiser said.
What Lincolnville did on Sunday was set up a port-a-tank to draft water and pumped it from there to an attack engine.
Fortunately, fire teams were able to continue hauling water to the port-a-tank thanks to an underground water tank at Centre High School.
According to Kaiser, that underground tank was installed years ago. There is also an underground water tank in Lost Springs. Kaiser also hopes to have an underground water tank in Lincolnville.
“In situations like this, we have one of our automatic aid engines respond to the high school to set up as a supply engine to fill the incoming tenders.
Most Marion County fire districts uhave a 1,000-gallon tender.
The best thing rural fire departments can do to combat water struggles is to train, Kaiser said.
“We train in water shuttling; we train in relay hopping,” Kaiser said. “Basically to combat these water struggles, if you’re in an area where you don’t have hydrants ,then just be creative, be familiar with water shuttle systems and optional ways of pumping water.”
The total response personnel on Sunday included 26 firefighters, two emergency medical service workers, two emergency management officials, and two sheriff’s deputies. They were at the site for almost four hours.
The scene was cleared about 8:45 a.m.