Good Samaritan Saves Two From Burning Trailer Home Near Evansville
No injuries were reported after a passerby saw a burning trailer home early Monday morning, woke the people inside and then helped them put out the fire.
Evansville Assistant Fire Chief Matt Gacke attributes the cause of the fire to a cigarette butt that was not entirely extinguished, according to an incident report from the Natrona County Sheriff's Office.
John Minsaas told deputies he was headed out to his parents' house around 1 a.m. Monday when he saw the burning trailer house.
He got out of his truck and pounded on the door of the trailer until the two people inside woke up and got out. Then Minsaas helped them put out the fire; deputies found him pouring water on the smoldering vinyl siding of the trailer house when they arrived around 1:15 a.m.
According to the incident report, a man who lived in the trailer told deputies he finished a cigarette at around 12:15 a.m. and tossed the burning butt into a plastic coffee can which was about a quarter full of old cigarette butts.
Then, he went to bed.
Gacke told a deputy that blowing winds swirled above the coffee can which contained the spent cigarette butts and fed oxygen to the burning cigarette butt.
The burning butt generated heat and caused the fire, Gacke said.