Children suspected of starting fire that destroyed abandoned trailer

An unoccupied single-wide trailer being prepared for removal from a lot at 515 NW Tenant St. was destroyed by fire last Thursday, and authorities suspect children may have set the blaze.

Fire crews were paged out just after 10:30 a.m. April 17 with a report that flames could be seen coming from the windows and roof of the trailer.

The structure was fully engulfed in fire by the time they arrived, and although it took only a few minutes to put the fire out, the trailer was totally destroyed.

The trailer was one of three on the lot, and there was no power hooked up to it.

The fire was so intense that Fire Chief Phil Gridley said the cause will probably never be determined for certain, "but we know kids have been playing in there, and we found in the adjoining trailers paper that had been set on fire in some of the sinks.

"Can we come up with a theory as to what happened? Yes. But not a definitive cause."

Because the trailer was in the process of being "junked out," Gridley said, the estimated loss was only a few thousand dollars.