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PRIEST RIVER — Priest River vehicles and a house caught fire the night of Monday, June 30.
West Pend Oreille Fire Department firefighters responded at 8:44 p.m. to a call reporting a structure fire on East Jefferson Avenue.
The cause and exact origins of the fire are under investigation. West Pend Oreille Fire District chief Jamie Painton said the fire possibly started at the vehicles — one of which witnesses said was a trailer — then spread to the house on the northwest corner of East Jefferson Avenue and Second Street. What witnesses heard going off in the fire was probably ammunition, Painton added.
The owners of the house and vehicles were not home during the fire. The Bonner County Sheriff’s Office requested at 9:10 p.m. that Jackson Avenue area residents evacuate their homes, and that others avoid the same area. No one was hurt.
It is unclear how the fire was discovered, Painton said, but several witnesses in the Priest River area saw a column of smoke rising from East Jefferson Avenue and Second Street before 9 p.m.
With assistance from the Selkirk Fire District, South Pend Oreille Fire and Rescue, Fire District 4, Priest River Police Department, Bonner County Sheriff’s Office, Bonner County Emergency Services and the Sandpoint Fire Department chief, Painton said WPOFD firefighters had the fire under control between 11 p.m. and midnight. About 28 firefighters were on the scene.
The Bonner County Sheriff’s Office lifted the evacuation request at 10:57 p.m.
