Breaking: Forward progress stopped in Gardnerville Ranchos duplex fire
DOUGLAS COUNTY, Nev. – Firefighters have stopped forward progress in a fire that may have destroyed as many as 10 units with 15-20 others whose residents will be displaced, according to East Fork Fire Chief Alan Ernst.
As of 1:30 p.m. Friday, Ernst said there were no reports of any injuries or people missing.
The major fire broke out in 2-3 duplexes on Pollen Court near the middle of the Gardnerville Ranchos commercial core, closing the area to traffic on Friday morning.
Evacuations have been conducted as the wind driven fire that was first reported at 11:30 a.m. Friday.
The fire is actively burning with East Fork, Tahoe Douglas and Carson City firefighters on scene.
Several of the duplexes have caught fire in the wind.
Douglas County deputies have shut down Tillman and Kimmerling to traffic for a time.
As of around 1 p.m. Friday, deputies were preparing to reopen Tillman and Kimmerling. Sheriff’s Search and Rescue team members were being assigned to conduct a hard closure of Short Court, Pit Road and Pollen Court.
That closure is likely to remain in place into the evening.
At one point deputies were going door to door in surrounding neighborhoods to alert residents of the possible threat from the fire.
High winds blasted the fire east sending up a smoke plume visible from across Carson Valley.
East Fork firefighters called for help from as far away as Reno and Sparks.
“Please avoid the area to allow fire resources to work,” the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office asked in a push notification.
There were early reports of residents inside the duplexes when the fire was first reported but as of 1:20 p.m. there have been no reports of casualties.
A stayput order for the Ranchos schools was lifted at 1:15 p.m., except for those students who live in the apartments near Pollen, and no one’s going into there, according to the Sheriff’s Office.
NV Energy reports 17 homes and businesses in the Gardnerville Ranchos without power right in the vicinity of the fire. The 89460 area code has six outages and 948 customers without power.
According to NVenergy.com, 1,699 customers are without power in Douglas County, many of whom are affected by the public safety outage due to the wind.
