Noctor Landmark Destroyed by Fire

A wind-driven blaze ripped through a well-known structure in the Noctor community on Friday afternoon despite the best efforts of four local agencies.  In its wake, nothing was left of the fifty-one-year-old structure but charred debris and ashes.

Dispatchers in Hazard received a 911 call shortly after 1:10 p.m. on Friday, March 13, reporting a building on fire near Ritchie Road.

Crews from the Rousseau Volunteer Fire Department were dispatched to the scene at 8577 Highway 30 East and found a large garage complex, owned by Earl Stevens, fully engulfed in flames.

According to officials, the fire has spread to three connected buildings and to several nearby fields and hillsides.

Fire crews had been on high alert after weather forecasts predicted a second day of high winds and red flag conditions, with gusts in the 50-60 mile-per-hour range and temperatures soaring to the low eighties.

“We had been very fortunate,” Thomas Smith, a ranger from the Kentucky Division of Forestry, said on Friday as he deployed his team.  “There have been several forest fires in eastern Kentucky and counties around Breathitt, but it has been quiet.  I guess not now.”

Smith led the squad of specially trained woodland firefighters called out by the state to help slow the grass and woodland fires that spread from the burning garage to nearby fields.

In addition to the Kentucky Division of Forestry, the Jackson and Vancleve Fire Departments sent personnel and equipment to the scene as mutual aid for Rousseau.

Upon arrival, Rousseau started efforts to slow the fire and protect a nearby trailer and several outbuildings.

“It was almost like a blow torch,” a firefighter said.  “There is not much we can do, or anybody can do right now.”

Flames burned quickly through the garage building and into the Hagins Cemetery located to the rear of the garage.  The fire quickly burned the flowers and decorations left by mourners and family members in the cemetery.  Swirling embers and debris from the fire, carried by gusts of wind, crossed Highway 30 and set the Bermuda grass of the Stevens and Manns Cemeteries ablaze, burning through those resting places and damaging several stones with melted plastic.

The wind drove the blaze across a small valley and onto the hillside formerly used by Stevens to graze cattle.  The blaze burned through the sage grass of the Landrum Cemetery and the twenty-five or so markers there.       

The flames, driven by the winds, burned east on Highway 30 for nearly a mile before they were slowed enough for fire crews to get ahead of them to make some progress at slowing the blaze.

Crews worked for several hours to control the blaze.  Firefighters sprayed several thousand gallons of water on the blaze as Division of Forestry Crews and the Jackson Fire Department worked on protecting several nearby homes from the advancing fire.

At one point, crews noticed that a secondary fire had started from blowing embers about a half a mile south of Ritchie Road.

By early evening, the blazes were declared contained.

Forestry crews estimated that the two Ritchie Road fires, as they were labeled, consumed a total of fourteen acres.

Owner Earl Stevens said the original part of the structure was built in 1975 to maintain his trucks and equipment during the coal boom in Breathitt County.  He later added several portions onto the original building as his needs grew.

“I just did what I always did,” he said.  “I went out there to piddle and started a fire because it was cold.  I put in some papers and walked to the house to check on the Kentucky basketball game.  The next thing I knew, it was on fire.” 

Even in tragedy, he was able to smile when someone said he could blame the fire on “this year’s Kentucky basketball team.”  He just grinned and nodded his head.

No estimate has been placed on the damage, but Steven said it was a “total loss.”  Inside the building were hundreds of pieces of equipment and tools.  Stevens said it was a lifetime.

Also lost were a boat, at least one ATV, and a tractor that Stevens attempted to get out, but the heat and flames prevented the door from opening.

Officials believe the fire was accidental.

Fire crews stayed on the scene for several hours into the night to ensure that the blaze was completely extinguished.  By the next morning, small hot spots still burned, and smoke swirled from the burned-out shell of the building.  Acres of burned grass and woodland marked both sides of Highway 30 East at Noctor.

“The good thing is,” Steven said. “It’s just a building, and nobody got hurt.  I got one in Heaven that they can't burn down.”