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Renovo Road home destroyed by fire Friday afternoon

LAURA JAMESON / THE EXPRESS Firefighters comb through the smoldering wreckage of 82 Oak Ridge Lane, Mill Hall.

MILL HALL — One fire truck after another could be seen racing north on Renovo Road, many of them heading south just as fast as they shuttled water to a spectacular fire at 82 Oak Ridge Lane in Colebrook Township, where a house was reduced to a pile of rubble in short order Friday afternoon.

A neighbor told The Express that the owner’s son raced to her home at about 12:30 p.m. shouting that there was a fire at his house.

The 2 1/2-story home was owned by Christy Young, who was en route to Florida when the fire began.

Norm Wolfrom, chief of Citizen’s Hose in Lock Haven, said the home was fully engulfed when firefighters arrived on scene. He said it was gone in about 45 minutes.

“We could see it coming down (Renovo Road) from Lock Haven,” Wolfrom said.

LAURA JAMESON / THE EXPRESS The fire at 82 Oak Ridge Lane burned hot enough to melt the front of the vehicle pictured at right.

Four people were taken to the UPMC Lock Haven, Wolfrom said. He said it didn’t appear they were seriously injured.

Wolfrom said the location of the house, along with the extremely hot outside temperatures, made the fire challenging to fight.

“See those burn marks,” Wolfrom said, pointing to the grass that was burned by the heat.

Several vehicles parked outside the house were damaged by fire and the siding on a nearby garage was melted. “That’s how hot it was,” Wolfrom said.

There’s a swimming pool near the home, but Wolfrom said they couldn’t use the water from the pool.

“We couldn’t get near it. It was too hot,” he said.

A state police fire marshal has been called to investigate the cause of the blaze.

Units from Lock Haven, Nittany Valley/Lamar, Renovo, Mill Hall, Dunnstown, Howard, Montoursville, Hope Hose, Woolrich, Flemington, Beech Creek, Lamar Township/Salona and Avis responded to the fire.

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