Fires in Girard unnerve residents

Staff report

GIRARD

Two house fires in less than 24 hours have neighbors in a South Market Street neighborhood on edge.

“Will our house be next?” asked Josephine Bach, who lives with her daughter, Alfonzina Chacon, at 418 S. Market.

She stood with her daughter and Sarah Loughrey, their neighbor across the street, as firefighters put out the second of the two fires Wednesday night. A vacant house behind Bach’s and Chacon’s caught fire around 8 p.m., said neighbor Tiffany Sotak, who called 911.

By 10 p.m., firefighters were dousing the last of the flames and were digging out a gas line with a backhoe.

Ohio Edison was turning off power.

Besides the house, a garage and a shed caught fire. Neighbors also said brush around the house went up.

At 12:30 a.m. Wednesday, the house next to Chacon’s and Bach’s caught fire.

“It hasn’t even been 24 hours,” said Sotak, who added that while the second house had been vacant for years, the first house had an occupant ready to move in.

“The lady was going to move in. She had stuff in it,” she said.

“Nothing like that’s ever happened in Girard before — not down here,” she added.

Chacon said she was awake until 4:30 a.m. Wednesday while firefighters battled the first fire.

She came home Wednesday evening to find the second fire, and she rushed to get one of her vehicles out of harm’s way.

“Now I’m worried,” Chacon said. “We got a life here.”

“This is scary,” said Loughrey, adding that she canceled vacation plans because she doesn’t want to leave her house.

There was no word Wednesday night on the cause of the fire.