Fire erupts in Worthington

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WORTHINGTON — A fire that started in the attic of an older house caused significant damage to the structure Tuesday night.

The Worthington Fire Department was paged at 10:22 p.m. to 1012 Burlington Ave., where smoke was reported coming from the upstairs. Worthington Fire Chief Rick von Holdt said the fire had likely been smoldering in the attic for a few hours before the smoke was spotted.

“There was a substantial amount of damage, and it had to have been burning for a while, because it had burned through the rafters already,” he said.

Von Holdt said the house was a rental property occupied by a single family. Due to the location of where it started, he attributed the probable cause of the fire to overload on an aging electrical system or faulty wiring.

The fire department was on the scene for almost an hour and a half, von Holdt said. Tuesday evening’s weather conditions posed a few problems in battling the blaze.

“It was raining … and it was slippery all around the house,” he said. “But we got on it right away and ventilated out the roof. We had to pull some of the ceiling because there was a lot of blown-in insulation that kind of smothered it. So it was maybe going for four to six hours before it came through.”

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