Mother, son escape another blaze

By Michele Marcotte in The Nacogdoches Daily Sentinel
A white country house on U.S. Highway 59 was heavily damaged in a Tuesday night fire that had firefighters from three area fire departments battling the blaze for nearly an hour. Vanessa Williams, who lived in the home with her 7-year-old son, said she was at home when she saw something begin to glow on her porch. Having lived through a previous house fire nearly a year ago, Williams grabbed her son, purse and phone and ran out the door.

She called 911 and her family, accidentally leaving her keys somewhere in the house. By the end of the night, while the entire back side of her home lay in a heap of ash, her truck still stood untouched by the flames in the adjacent carport.

“I lost almost everything in the first fire, and probably the four or five things I kept I lost in this one,” she said.

James Russell, assistant fire chief of the Central Heights Fire Department, said the fire appears to have started in the back of the house and moved into the attic.

He told Williams’ family, who had gathered outside to watch firefighters from Appleby, Central Heights and Nacogdoches fire departments extinguish the flames, that while the fire had been contained to the south side of the house, there would still be a lot of smoke damage. He gauged the home at a 50 percent loss.