A Taos home was engulfed in flames the night of Sept. 20. The Taos Volunteer Fire Department received the call at 8:21 p.m.
The home was located at 631 Calle De Cosme, near Los Pandos Road and U.S. 64.
According to fire department assistant chief Anthony Martinez, the owner of the property said he woke up to discover flames in a bedroom. Martinez said by the time the owner ran to his neighbor’s house and called 911, much of the house was in flames. Martinez said the cause of the fire has not yet been determined. “When we got there, every room was on fire,” he said, adding that it didn’t appear that the owner, Richard Trujillo, had been injured.
“The poor guy lost everything,” Martinez said. He added there were no pets involved in the incident.
Twenty-one firefighters fought the fire for four hours, Martinez said. The crew operated two tanker trucks, three fire trucks and two “wild land engines.” Wild land engines are off-road trucks that were used to put out a grass fire caused by the blaze, “so it didn’t spread to neighboring houses,” Martinez said. There was also an ambulance on the scene — protocol in case someone is hurt — he said.