By Paul Thompson

Northeast News

June 9, 2016

KANSAS CITY, Missouri – A blazing fire in the Historic Northeast on Wednesday, June 8 left one home destroyed and another damaged.

The dangerous fire erupted near the intersection of N. White and Norledge at around 8:00 p.m., leaving little but the smoldering remains of a house that once stood in the 300 block of N. White. Area resident Larry Goodman, who lives down the block on N. White, described the intensity of the flames.

“Before the fire department showed up, there was a great big wall of fire,” said Goodman. “I had never seen anything like it in my life.”

The blaze marks the second fire incident on that block of N. White Avenue over the past month. On Tuesday, May 17, 35-year-old Amanda Drake was charged with aggravated assault for allegedly lighting her boyfriend on fire on the 300 block of N. White. Chris Daily, an area resident who lives on the 400 block of Bellaire Ave., was at the scene. He and his wife took photos and video of the fire.

“It was as high as the trees; it was overwhelming,” said Daily. “I’ve never seen anything like it. You could feel the heat.”

Daily added that once the fire department responded, they extinguished the flames relatively quickly.

“By the time we noticed it, the fire department was arriving on scene. They were able to take care of it in 30-45 minutes,” he said. “The fire department handled it very well.”

According to at least one nearby property owner, the vacant property that caught fire had seen its share of issues in the recent past. John Lober owns the property next door to the site of the fire, and he says his office had made several calls about the troublesome property. He noted that in spite of a previous fire that had severely damaged the structure, people had been living in the garage.

“The only part they were living in was the garage, because it had a concrete floor. The other part was too dangerous, because it had already caught on fire before. It was in pretty bad shape,” said Lober. “People were always living here – they were there all the time. They were actually running their electrical cords over to my house and plugging in. I’d come here about every day and there would be an electrical cord plugged in, running over to their place.”

Lober has been working to fix up his property to rent it, but now he’s going back in to fix the damage caused as a result of the fire.

“We just re-painted all the trim, I sanded all the oak floors down, and I got a stained new finish,” said Lober. “Again, the fire started next door, and we’ve been calling on it. People shouldn’t have been living there, and all of this shouldn’t have happened.”