Amherst mobile home lost to morning fire

AMHERST – No one was injured, but a local family was left homeless early Friday morning when their mobile home was destroyed in a fire, according to a fire official.

Floyd Lawrence, chief of the Aurora Fire Department, said Friday the 3 a.m. blaze was started by a wood stove inside the Holly Cram Road home of Norman Grindle.

The fire chief said he is not sure how the fire started.

“By the time we got there, it was basically fully involved,” Lawrence said. “There was not enough left to make a determination.”

The trailer was insured, he said. Grindle and his family were put up at an area motel by the Red Cross, the fire chief said.

Lawrence said roughly 15 firefighters from Aurora, Mariaville and Osborne fought the blaze and had it extinguished within a few hours. He said the cold made some of the firetruck pumps freeze up, and firefighters fought the fire defensively to keep it from spreading.

“When it’s fully involved, those old trailers, there’s nothing you can do for them,” Lawrence said.