by Frank Lee
operations@thenewsleaders.com
A house fire north of St. Joseph started last week with a dump truck that had hit a power pole, which caused the power line to trap a St. Joseph man in another truck.
A dump truck from Schroder Inc., driven by 65-year-old Ralph Schroden had been dumping a load of soil in front of the house on Sept. 1.
As Schroden pulled away, his vehicle caught the power line and brought down the power pole, causing the power line to fall on top of a truck, trapping 77-year-old Ralph Eiynck of St. Joseph.
“From what witnesses say, it was like a chain reaction,” St. Joseph Fire Chief Jeff Taufen said. “The power line was busted, which also busted the power pole, which landed on top of his vehicle.”
Eiynck decided to remain inside his vehicle until help from Stearns County Sheriff’s Office, the St. Joseph Fire Department and other local first-responders arrived at the scene of the accident.
“We had no way of knowing for sure if the power was off or not,” Taufen said. “I pulled up on scene, made sure he was OK – he was still in the truck – and I told him to stay there until we could get the power company there to make sure the power was off . . . He made the wise choice by staying in his vehicle.”
Eiynck was trapped inside his vehicle for about 10 minutes before Stearns Electric quickly arrived, Taufen said, but not before the downed power line also sparked a fire at Jennifer Warnert’s home at 8988 320th St., off of Stearns CR 2.
“They were doing some road construction, and a dump truck was dumping some dirt, pulled out, got the power line, pulled the power line, which snapped the power pole, which landed on top of a pick-up, which in turn looks like the cause of the house fire,” Taufen said.
He said the state fire marshall would be investigating the cause of the house fire. Firefighters put out the fire on the home’s exterior but discovered the basement was also on fire, making the house unlivable because of the interior damage.
“When we pulled up, the gas meter on the outside of the house was on fire,” Taufsen said, “so there was gas burning from the meter around the outside of the house. We extinguished that, we shut the gas off. Then we went inside the house and found it full of smoke, searched the main floor for any fire victims, there was nobody home, realized there were more issues downstairs, so we pulled the team out, went back in a different way downstairs and found there was fire in the basement ceiling.”
Eiynck was taken to St. Cloud Hospital to be checked out as a precaution, but no one seemed seriously injured in the blaze, Taufen said.
