Firefighters were able to control a 1 a.m. mobile home fire in just two minutes Wednesday but not before the blaze burned so hot it melted a bathtub.
All three occupants of the double-width trailer escaped without injury. But the slightest change in circumstances could have been fatal, said fire Capt. Fred Dumas.Mary Ann Haight, 3842 S. Chickadee Drive, had just gone to bed, as had her son and mother, when the water heater ignited the floor under it, spreading smoke and fire into the trailer from the bathroom. There was no smoke alarm in the trailer, but the smoke aroused Haight's son, who alerted his mother and grandmother.
"We had a crew just breaking loose from a medical call in the same trailer park," Dumas said.
Only light smoke was showing, but the fire built so fast it had destroyed the bathroom, melting the bathtub, and had scorched the ceiling and walls from one end of the trailer to the other.
"We're real fortunate we didn't lose anybody," Dumas said.
Damage to the home and its contents was estimated at $20,000.