By DON FLETCHER
News Staff Writer
Atmore Fire Department Chief Ron Peebles said last week that investigators had not yet determined just what caused a September 24 housefire that consumed a Fennell Street residence.
“We’re labeling it as undetermined right now,” Peebles said of the blaze that destroyed the house, a wood frame structure that had no electricity service but indications that people were living there. “We’re not exactly sure if anybody was living there regular, but some folks told us they lived there. There was a bed in the house; there were some clothes in there, too.”
City firefighters were dispatched at 4:12 p.m. and arrived at 4:15. A Poarch Creek Indians unit and crew, who answered the call under a mutual aid agreement, arrived shortly thereafter. They battled the intense flames for almost two hours before gaining control of the fire and clearing the scene.
“It was a tough fire to fight,” Peebles said. “The guys did a good knockdown, but flames were coming out the front door and two side windows when we got there. The porch roof had already burned and fallen off.”
He said the house, located on a one-block city street about a block west of Martin Luther King Drive, was a total loss.