Fire destroys one Lexington house, damages four others

One house was destroyed and four others were damaged Tuesday in a fire in southeast Lexington.

Firefighters who were called to 625 Stansberry Cove at 4:35 p.m. found heavy smoke and flames coming from the two-story house. They went inside but had to evacuate because the roof began to collapse, Battalion Chief Jeff Nantz said.

Firefighters arrived five minutes after they received the call about the fire, Nantz said. It took 30 to 45 minutes to get the fire under control.

The cause of the fire was not immediately known. No injuries were reported.

The houses on each side of the house, and two behind it on Willman Way, had relatively minor damage from the fire. Nantz said most of the damage was from melted siding, although the fire did get into the attic of one house.

Less than 7 feet separated 625 Stansberry Cove from the house next to it on one side and less than 10 feet from the house on the other side, Nantz said. Stansberry Cove is off Hays Boulevard between Athens-Boonesboro Road and Interstate 75.

“They’re just built too close together,” he said. In the past year, he said, in at least three fires in the subdivisions around Hays Boulevard and Blackford Parkway, flames spread from one house to another.

“That’s beginning to be commonplace,” he said. “We’re going to see more and more of this as time goes on.”

About 50 firefighters were at the fire.

Nantz said a woman and two daughters were home when the fire started.

Melissa Riddell, who lives two doors down from the house, said she tried calling 911 multiple times, and another woman knocked on the door to alert those inside.

“I panicked,” she said. “We were trying to move cars and do whatever we could do.”

This story was originally published May 17, 2016 at 6:12 PM with the headline "Fire destroys one Lexington house, damages four others."