An early morning fire with no one at home destroys an East Texas home and turns out to be the residence of a first-responder.
It happened just after 5 Saturday morning at a home on county road 173 near FM 1249, just east of Kilgore.
A burned out shell is all that remains of an old wood home on county road 173, just east of Kilgore. In a raging fire at 5:40 this morning.
"The structure was probably about 40 percent involved, heavily on the B-side or the left side of the structure, fire venting out of the windows and the roof line when we arrived," says Kilgore fire captain Micheal Stanley.
On duty, Rusk County patrol deputy Clint Ruthven was called out to help.
“We actually received a 9-1-1 phone call from one of my neighbors. They gave an address that wasn’t close to mine so I was thinking that one of my neighbors' houses was on fire,” Ruthven says.