Brockville firefighters managed to contain a fire at a Hartley Street home to a basement room Thursday afternoon after forcing their way into the house.
Firefighters got the call at 3:02 p.m. after a neighbour spotted the fire at an unoccupied house, said Brockville Deputy Fire Chief Chris Paul.
They arrived to find “visible smoke and flames on the north side of the building,” at 182 Hartley Street, at the corner of Rivers Avenue, said Paul.
The fire department responded with 13 firefighters in three vehicles, he added. They found the fire was self-ventilating on the north side and opted for a “transitional attack” before eventually forcing their way into the house in an “offensive attack.”
“We did entry on the ground level, right into the basement, and we confined the fire to … the northeast room on the bottom floor,” said Paul.
The homeowner does not live at the property and there was no one inside at the time, said the deputy chief. No one was injured.
It didn’t take firefighters long to get the blaze under control, but they needed a lot of time to look for hot spots and conduct overhaul, making sure all was clear.
There was no damage to the second floor and no structural damage, said Paul.
While the value of the fire damage could reach $100,000, it was too early to determine the additional value of the contents lost to the flames, said the deputy chief. Insurance company officials were to make a more detailed assessment.
It was also too early to pin down a specific cause of the fire, but Paul said the incident is not suspicious.