Updated: Kirbyville Dollar General had a fire scare Saturday afternoon
Updated: Just before 2 pm today, the Kirbyville Volunteer Fire Department was called out to Hwy 96 and County Rd 619 for a report of a power line on fire after a tree had fallen on it.
Exactly 7 minutes later, Kirbyville VFD received a secondary call from the Dollar General on the south end of town. Store manager Christine Abshire stated that the power had gone out and there was smoke pouring inside the building from an unknown location. The building was quickly evacuated.
KVFD Captain Michael Swann said that the location of the original call was right next to the secondary call. The high winds caused a tree to fall across the power line which could have been the cause of the situation at the store but they are waiting for the official report.
The Co-op repaired the downed power line, but at the time of our interview, Dollar General management was awaiting the all clear to turn the power back on and reopen the store.
At 7:30 pm, KVFD Chief Greg Ellis told ETB that the fire at Dollar general was an air-conditioning motor that had burned up. When asked if it was at all related to the power line Ellis said, "It could have been a surge that caused the fire", but there was no actual way of finding out for sure.
