LAKEPORT — A Lakeport woman said she wasn”t upset her trailer on Parallel Drive burned Wednesday afternoon and she still plans on selling clothes and belongings set aside for a yard sale.
“But my underwear is all burnt up,” Pat Kacharos said. “I”m going to have to go to Walmart to buy some more.”
Kacharos was cutting blackberry bushes with electric hedge clippers when she backed up and cut the cord, she said. She disconnected the clipper from the extension cord, but didn”t disconnect the extension cord from her house.
Chief Ken Wells of Lakeport fire said the short followed the cord to the trailer, igniting vegetation just behind it. The blaze destroyed the trailer and burned some of the surrounding plants and grass. Sparks from the fire lit a small patch of grass alongside Highway 29, which fire crews quickly extinguished. No injuries were reported and no other structures were threatened.
Kacharos said after she cut the cord, she went inside to take a nap.
“It”s a good thing I didn”t,” she said.
Electricity to the house went down and she couldn”t call 9-1-1, she said. A man stopped and got Kacharos out of the house along with her electric wheelchair.
“The rest of it, you can”t cry over stuff,” Kacharos said. “My cat, I”m worried about my cat. I think the cat is smart enough to get away.”
She said she has friends and family who she can stay with.
“A person doesn”t need 20 blouses,” Kacharos said. “You only need about five.”
Tyler Johnston of Central Striping Services said he was working on the Highway 29 project when he smelled the smoke. He saw a man jump out of his truck, look around the trailer and help Kacharos get out.
“When they got out, all of a sudden it just went poof,” Johnston said. “It sounded like a propane tank blew up.”
Wells said people should be careful with equipment especially when they run it through dry vegetation.
The Lakeport Fire Protection District, Kelseyville Fire Protection District, CALFIRE, California Highway Patrol, Lakeport Police and Pacific Gas & Electric responded to the fire.
Contact Katy Sweeny at kdsweeny@gmail.com or call her directly at 263-5636, ext. 37.
