Placer County - Barn fire - One injury

Barn fire sends one to hospital

Ben Furtado A suspected trailer explosion set a barn on fire in Newcastle Tuesday evening. One woman went to the hospital with serious injuries.

A suspected trailer explosion set off a barn blaze in rural Placer County sending flames more than 60 feet into the air and one woman to the hospital with serious injuries Tuesday evening.

Fire crews responded to a report of a barn fire just north of Chili Hill Road on Gold Hill Road around 5:30 p.m. Tuesday.

A woman in her 50s was in a 40-foot trailer, housed in a 40-by-100-foot barn when, for unknown reasons, there was an explosion that quickly engulfed the hay-filled barn, according to Greg Guyan, Auburn-area Cal Fire battalion chief.

The woman, who was not identified, was transported by air ambulance to the UC Davis Medical Center with second- and third-degree burns to 50 percent of her body, officials said.

The blast, and possibly the subsequent blaze, split the trailer in half. A car parked next to the engulfed barn was quickly charred.

Fire crews did not dose the flames with water, but instead were going to let the flaming bales of hay burn out.

“There is an NID canal directly adjacent to the barn,” said Battallion Chief Jeff Brand, with Cal Fire. “Any run off from the fire would go directly into the ditch.”

Firefighters were expected to be on scene throughout the night monitoring the contained fire.

Neighbors quickly came to the woman’s aid.

“My father went to her and she was conscious,” neighbor James Bolton said at the scene Tuesday night. “Hopefully she’ll be OK.”

Source: Placeropolis.com: