Outhouse becomes smokehouse
Firefighters’Sunday interrupted by odd call
News editor
A Sunday call to Marion firefighters for an outhouse fire at the county lake may have had some wondering what time of year it was.
“The last one I knew was Halloween on Main St.,” fire chief Mike Regnier said.
A call about 1:20 p.m. said that smoke was streaming from a stone outhouse on the east end of the lake, on a hill just above the low-water bridge.
“Somebody that was camping over there called dispatch, and they brought out the fire department,” lake superintendent Isaac Hett said.
The first firefighters on the scene reported that the outhouse was filled with smoke, but no damage was observed.
“Somebody must have been bored and wanted to set something on fire,” Regnier said. “It’s a good thing they did it in a stone building. We just filled it with water and went home.”
So what caused a fire in an outhouse?
“Somebody I guess had balled up some clothes, lighted them on fire, and threw it down the hole,” Hett said. “I don’t know if they were mad at somebody and tried to burn their clothes, or how that came about. It could’ve got bad, but they were able to put it out, and it didn’t cause any real damage.”
A sudden influx of water far exceeded the capacity of the outhouse, so there’s still a little work left to get it back in operating order, Hett said.
“We’ll have to get it pumped out,” he said, “but that’s better than the roof burning.”