“They had a shed that caught on fire and extended to the home, the shed was relatively close and there was a lot of fuels in that shed,” Griffith said. “It extended to the house and got up in the attic space. It’s a modular home, those are built a little different and when they get up in that void space the fire runs pretty fast and hot.”
He said the walls are still standing and part of the roof, but with water and smoke damage the structure is a total loss. He said they are living in their “fifth wheel” camper now “while they figure out their next moves, is what I understand.”
An email from GoFundMe to the Journal-News details what Mike and Jeannie Hargis and her son, Hamilton firefighter Bryan Hanna experienced.
“I have been a firefighter for nearly 20 years, as we sat there and watched everything they own burn down, for the first time in nearly 48 years I was left me without words,” Hanna shared on his social media page (facebook.com/bryan.hanna). “It all went so fast, and now they are left to pick up the pieces of those few that remain.”
While the Hargis family and their two dogs were unharmed, they lost all of their belongings. The GoFundMe has a goal of raising $10,000. As of Thursday morning donations totaled $3,690.
Griffith said they needed tankers so they received mutual aid from Reily, Ross, Colerain, Crosby and Hanover townships, Oxford, Harrison and New Trenton in Indiana.
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