Two adults were displaced following a vacant house fire Wednesday in Taft, according to the Kern County Fire Department.
According to KCFD, when crews arrived the building was already well involved with fire. Due to the close proximity to neighboring buildings fire had also spread into the attic of another structure.
Firefighters worked quickly to conduct searches in all buildings for trapped occupants and began extinguishing the fire.
The construction of the buildings, combined with large amounts of belongings on the properties, made fire suppression efforts extremely labor intensive and required firefighters from three KCFD Battalions to provide the necessary manpower.
Firefighters were committed to the incident for over three hours and successfully contained the fire to the two buildings that were burning upon arrival. City officials determined to use heavy equipment to completely demolish the building of fire origin due to the building’s extensive fire damage.
Another nearby structure and the local Masonic Temple were saved from burning and two kittens were saved during today’s incident.
Fire crews also worked with the resident of one of the structures to retrieve various valuable belongings that were very important to the family. The cause of the fire is being investigated by members of the Kern County Fire Department Arson Unit. T
here were no injuries to civilians or firefighters reported. Two adults were displaced and are receiving assistance from Red Cross and City Serve.
