Rural barn burns, animals escape

A barn is a complete loss after a fire in rural Custer County last Wednesday.
At around 1 p.m. April 10 Custer County Dispatch received a call about a structure fire on the north end of North Pole Road. Three trucks from the Custer Volunteer Fire Department responded, as well as two trucks from the Argyle Volunteer Fire Department and one truck from the Pringle Volunteer Fire Department.
The homeowners had a heat lamp in the barn for animals, which apparently was knocked over and caused the blaze. All of the animals were able to get out of the barn safely.
Selena Spring, secretary of the Custer Volunteer Fire Department, served as incident commander on the fire and said a fence got knocked down during the fire so the animals were “running everywhere.”
“It was literally a zoo there for a while,” she said.
The barn was fully engulfed by the time firefighters arrived, and the barn is a total loss. Some items within the barn were lost as well.
Spring said the tenders that responded had to drive 20 minutes one way back to town for water, as it was the nearest hydrant to the fire.
Spring added firefighters were lucky in that the fire did not spread into nearby forest land, as the wind was strong that day.
“It stayed contained to where the barn was,” she said. “There was no spread. We got lucky because there was a high potential for it to go wildland.”
Fire units from both South Dakota Wildland Fire and the U.S. Forest Service were also dispatched to the scene in case the fire spread.