Primghar, Iowa — Details are now available on a field fire that eventually spread to the shingles of a house northeast of Primghar.
Primghar Fire Chief Gary Lansink tells KIWA that Friday afternoon, a resident at 6130 – 360th Street, about six miles northeast of Primghar, had pushed over an old corn crib, and was in the process of burning it. A Hartley firefighter, who was passing the scene at the time, thought it looked as though the fire was getting out of control, and called out his fire department.
Lansink says that, during the workday, many area fire departments are short-handed, and only four firefighters were available to respond from Hartley. As a result, the Primghar Fire Department was paged to respond. But Primghar only had four firefighters available, as well, so the call was put out for the Sanborn Fire Department, which responded with another four firefighters.
Lansink says the northwest winds blew embers from the corn crib fire onto the roof of the nearby house, ignited some shingles. He says firefighters extinguished the flaming shingles before any major damage occurred.
Chief Lansink says the departments use about 2-thousand gallons of water battling the blaze, and damage to the house was limited to the shingles. Lansink estimated about $1-thousand in damage to the shingles.
Fire departments were on-scene for about an hour.
