Osage City Fire

When we pulled into Osage City last night the downtown was on fire. Fire trucks and emergency vehicles everywhere. We went by my district office to see if there was any damage. Just a little smoke but everything was fine. We are a storage facility for many on Market Street this morning that had to protect items from the fire.

Firefighters from neighboring areas help battle downtown fire
By Phil Anderson
The Capital-Journal
Published Monday, March 02, 2009

OSAGE CITY — Vickie Buenger and her family were watching the Kansas-Missouri basketball game on television Sunday afternoon when they heard sirens from a fire truck go past their home, then stop about a block to the west.
"We're nosy," Buenger said, "so we looked outside to see what was going on."

Buenger said some smoke was visible from the 500 block of Market Street in Osage City's historic business district. The smoke appeared to be coming from behind a turn-of-the-century building that housed Mink Photography, 531 Market St., and the Ramblin Rose gift store, 529 Market St.

Buenger said the fire seemed small at first but quickly escalated, engulfing the two-story red-brick building in flames.

The blaze, which began about 2 p.m., was the biggest Buenger can recall in Osage City. Longtime residents said the biggest fire in town before Sunday is believed to have occurred nearly 100 years ago.

Osage County Fire District 2 was first on the scene. Mutual aid calls were answered by fire departments from Lyndon, Scranton, Melvern, Burlingame, Carbondale, Mission Township and the Metropolitan Topeka Airport Authority, the latter two of which brought aerial trucks that sprayed water down onto the fire from platforms that extended high into the air.

Osage County Fire District 2 Chief Dan Romine said the blaze started in the rear, or south side, of the building, then moved to its upper floor. The fire spread in part, he said, because of the way the building was constructed.

"There were multiple ceilings and voids, and we weren't able to contain the fire," Romine said. "We were able to save the buildings on both sides of it. They have a little smoke and water damage, but we were able to save them."

The business to the east is Osage Hardware, 533 Market St., and on the west is the Osage County Herald-Chronicle newspaper, 527 Market St.

As additional fire trucks rolled into town Sunday afternoon, dozens of Osage City residents gathered on nearby blocks in temperatures of about 20 degrees.

Jason Croucher, 25, a member of the city council in Osage City, was among those who came to the scene.

He estimated about 50 people, including himself, helped move merchandise out of several businesses along the south side of the 500 block of Market Street, where the fire occurred. The items were placed on the sidewalk on the north side of the street.

Croucher said many items from the Ramblin Rose store were brought out of the building before the fire spread. He also said the computer server and archived newspapers were taken out of the Osage County Herald-Chronicle as a precaution.

Additional items were taken out of two drugstores, a furniture store and a Radio Shack on the south side of the 500 block of Market Street.

"I'm so, so proud of the people of Osage City," Croucher said of the town of around 3,000 residents, located about 35 miles southwest of Topeka. "People really pitched in. I'm awfully proud of them."

Fire crews were on the scene late into the night Sunday, battling hot spots and flame flare-ups in an effort to contain the blaze to the building of origin.

Authorities said an apartment was located above the Ramblin Rose store, and all items inside it were destroyed. No injuries had been reported in connection with the fire by 9 p.m. Sunday.
However, responders were called about 8 p.m. to a car-pedestrian accident that was reported at 5th and Market Street, just west of the fire scene. Authorities said late Sunday they had no reports of serious injuries in connection with the accident.

Investigators with the Kansas State Fire Marshal's Office are to be at the scene early today to begin sifting through the debris in an attempt to determine the cause of the blaze, which by Sunday night was undetermined. An estimated dollar loss wasn't immediately available.