Fire destroys home in Sawyer

A rural Sawyer home at 1252 Mission Road was completely consumed by fire early Saturday morning.

According to Cloquet Area Fire District chief Kevin Schroeder, the severe damage was the result of "an extreme delay" calling 911, because the two people who escaped the structure did not have phones with them.

"The guy exited the home as it was filling with smoke and couldn't find his cell phone," Schroeder said. "So he had to truck through thew woods and the snow, pounding on doors until he found someone who was home and would call 911 for him."

The call came in at 5:11 a.m., Schroeder said, estimating that it had probably been 30-40 minutes by then.

"By the time we got there, it was half a house," Schroeder said. "We just extinguished most of the flames and contained it so there were no further threats."

CAFD took 11 minutes to reach the home, responding with trucks from three of the five CAFD stations, plus Carlton sent an additional tanker truck. The chief said the fire was mostly knocked down within 15-20 minutes of their arrival, but they continued to soak the site because the collapse of the home made it hard to reach fires still burning under the debris.

The cause of the fire is still under investigation. Schroeder didn't have any particular advice regarding this particular fire scenario, except that keeping a phone in the same location every night is a good idea in case of emergencies.

It's been a bad year for fires.

"We've probably had half a dozen house fires in the last six weeks," Schroeder said. "No particular reason, except there are more house fires in the winter than the summer. And not all of them were completely destroyed, like this one."

Both occupants were treated for minor smoke inhalation at the scene, but did not require further medical treatment, Schroeder said.