(La Porte County, IN) - Further discoveries made in the investigation of  Thursday morning fire that destroyed a house in northern La Porte County now suggest that it might have had something to do with a space heater. 

 

 Zach Rasiuk, Chief of the Kankakee Township Volunteer Fire Department, has now called attention to a plugged-in space heater beside an underground well pump. He said the fire appears to have started in that area because that’s where the fire damage was heaviest.

“That’s where most of the charring was,” he said.

 

He said the investigation, with help from the Indiana State Fire Marshal’s Office, is continuing.

 

Nobody was home at about 9 a.m. on the day of the incident when the fire broke out on Fail Road just north of U.S. 20. According to La Porte County Police, the owner, Daniel Adams, told investigators he was out running errands and left about 15 minutes before firefighters were called.

 

His wife, Nicole, said she was at her job as a dietician at the Washington Park Zoo in Michigan City when she was contacted on her phone by friends about the blaze. The single-story ranch structure the couple had lived in for just over 25 years was a total loss, with the roof itself having collapsed.

 

Rasiuk said that over the years, the home was added onto several times, which made reaching all of the flames quickly enough more challenging.

 

“The fire started down low and crawled up the walls into the attic area and just took off. It was hard to get to once it started going across the attic area,” he said.

 

Firefighters were there for about six hours.