Duplex fire causes minimal damage

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CROWN POINT — On a chilly Sunday morning in February the last think any resident wants to hear is “Fire.” Actually that is the last thing you ever want to hear.

But one duplex resident in the 300 block of North Indiana Avenue can thank his fine nose for smelling something like plastic burning.

According to Fire Chief Greg DeLor the resident told him he couldn’t find anything in his unit and looked outside to see if something out there was burning.

That is when he saw the smoke and called 911. He got the residents out of both units as the Fire-Rescue Department was screaming to their aid.

“With a full crew the answer time was just one minute,” Fire Chief Greg DeLor said. He added, “The mere fact that we got a crew there so quickly, the fire didn’t have a chance to grow, making damage minimal.”

All this took place at 10:40 a.m. on Sunday, Feb. 12. The fire station is just one-half mile from this property, located on Indiana Avenue between North and Porter streets.

According to DeLor, it was not a big fire. These duplexes have little storerooms with access only from the outside of the building. A malfunctioning heat tape on one of the water lines started the fire. It stayed in the storeroom that is used to house not just the water lines but also the gas meters to both units.

DeLor said that the burning smell of plastic was real. The electrical fire melted a gas meter. That made it impossible to shut off the gas.

The firefighters could not put out the fire until NIPSCO arrived and turned off the source of fuel for the fire. They could only contain it until then.

They had to wait for NIPSCO to get a street crew out on that Sunday morning to dig a hole and then clamp the line in order to stop the flow of gas that was fueling the fire.

The fire also burned off the electric connection going into both units in the building.

While firefighters were there by 10:41 a.m. the Crown Point Civil Defense and Fire-Rescue department were still blocking off both ends of Indiana Avenue around noon.

Because there was no gas or electricity in the building, it was deemed uninhabitable.

The NIPSCO inspector was there just shortly after the fire trucks, but he could not do anything. He had to wait for the street crew with a backhoe to get there and dig the hole that allows the gas to be shut off.