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While authorities are still investigating the cause of a house fire that killed an Ely woman, foul play is not suspected.
The Ely Fire Department issued a press release last week in connection with a blaze that consumed an Ely home and resulted in the death of the lone occupant, Diane Larson, 64.
According to the news release, “the Ely Fire Department and Minnesota State Fire Marshal’s office have determined the cause to be accidental, and in no way suspicious.”
Ely Fire Chief Dave Marshall offered further information Tuesday, when he briefed city council members about the fire, which occurred at a two-story dwelling located at 254 North Fifth Avenue East.
Fire crews were able to establish command at both the front and rear of the house, which enabled the department to send crews in from both sides.
“The first priority was search and rescue as we believed we had a victim inside, and the second priority was suppression,” said Marshall.
The EFD soon determined it was a basement fire, which posed additional risks.
“The access becomes the chimney because all of the heat and smoke is going up, so it’s difficult to access because of that,” said Marshall.
Fire suppression was needed to bring down excessive heat and smoke, and the victim was located and later transported by ambulance to Ely-Bloomenson Community Hospital, where she was pronounced dead.
Marshall said 23 EFD members responded to the call, along with roughly sixto- eight members of the Morse-Fall Lake Department and the same number from the Babbitt Fire Department.
“I was proud of how all three departments coordinated and worked together on this call,” said Marshall. “There were teams that made multiple entries into the structure to perform search and rescue.”
Marhall added “I can assure you the Ely Fire Department takes incidents like this seriously. It’s important to me we spend time with our fire department and our firefighters, particularly the ones who were in contact with the victim.”
The fire also offered a couple of serious lessons, according to the chief.
“The first is that if you heat your house with a wood stove, wood stoves require maintenance,” said Marshall. “They require more maintenance than fuel oil or propane boilers require. Wood stoves are dangerous. You see fires in town. You see carbon monoxide calls in town caused by wood stoves that have not been properly maintained.”
The other deals with smoke alarms.
“I don’t think I can say enough about the importance of smoke detectors,” said Marshall. “Smoke detectors truly save lives and to have structures that don’t have smoke detectors in them, there’s just no excuse for that.”
