July 2, 2001

PRESS RELEASE

To: Newsroom

For Immediate Release

Contact: Brian A. Crawford, Public Information Officer

Phone: 673-6652, cell: 455-2609, page: 675-2137

Man Injured in Morning House Fire

■ Blaze heavily damages Lakeside residence

A Shreveport man was injured this morning in a fire that left a Lakeside home partially destroyed. Firefighters responded to 3102 Milam Street this morning just after 11:00 a.m. and found flames and smoke pouring from the front and back of the two story structure. Perry Kelly, 20, told fire officials that he was in the kitchen of the home and had turned on the electric stove when a skillet began smoking and then caught fire. Kelly stated that he tried to extinguish the blaze with flour as instructed by the home’s security company but the fire became too intense.

When fire crews arrived from the nearby Milam Street station, Kelly was out of the home and sitting in a police cruiser. He was treated by department paramedics for smoke inhalation at the scene and transported to Willis Knighton Medical Center on Greenwood Road for further evaluation. Firefighters, led by Captain Robert Jenkins, entered the residence through a broken window in the back of the home to fight the blaze that had already consumed the entire kitchen and living room of the bottom floor. Additional companies were sent to the second floor to release superheated gasses and heat, trapped by the closed upstairs of the structure, before they could catch fire. After 30 minutes of intense firefighting that was exacerbated by the hot and humid weather conditions, firefighters brought the blaze under control at 11:30 a.m.

Fire investigators have listed the official cause of the fire as a stove burner being left on under a pot in the kitchen. The first floor suffered heavy fire and smoke damage with the second floor having heat and smoke damage. ###