Water Damage

South Main Street in Chambersburg, between Washington and Liberty streets, was closed to traffic for about 90 minutes as fire crews responded to a fire at 256 S. Main St. just after noon Tuesday. Chambersburg Emergency Services Chief William FitzGerald said the building has apartments on the first and second floor, but neither apartment was occupied at the time of the blaze. FitzGerald said the first floor was being used as a meeting place for Alcoholics Anonymous. He said the fire started in a bathroom on the first floor.

Name of business: 1-800 Water Damage Owner: Lynn Deibert Address: P.O. Box 22, Fairplay, MD 21733 Opening date: Nov. 1, 2009 Products and services: "We provide residential and commercial water damage remediation services, provided by an IICRC (Institute of Inspections, Cleaning and Restoration Certification) certified firm. All of our technicians and owner are IICRC certified. "We specialize in applied structural drying of water-damaged structures.

Approximately 15 to 20 patients and employees were evacuated from a section of Reeders Memorial Home on Sunday morning after an electrical short in a light fixture set off the sprinkler system, Boonsboro Fire Capt. Tommy Arnold said. No one was injured, Arnold said. Emergency services officials said the incident was reported at about 7:30 a.m. Sunday at the nursing home, which is at 141 S. Main Street in Boonsboro. The electrical short occurred in a light fixture in a residential patient room on the second floor, Arnold said.

The National Weather Service confirmed Saturday that straight-line winds not a tornado damaged the Mercersburg Printing building off Pa. 16 in Franklin County Friday night. Weather service meteorologist John LaCorte said thunderstorms caused localized winds that damaged Mercersburg Printing at 9964 Buchanan Trail West, Mercersburg. Straight-line winds knock everything down in the same direction,  whereas a tornado will cause chaotic damage  - some trees will go one way and others in another direction, LaCorte said.

A Waynesboro, Pa., family was displaced by a fire Monday afternoon at 1600 East Main St., Waynesboro Fire Department Lt. John Beck said. The homeowners were home when the fire started at about 1:20 p.m. and escaped safely, Beck said. Firefighters had the fire under control within about 10 minutes of arriving, but remained at the scene until about 4 p.m., he said. The fire appeared to have started on the second floor and might have been electrical in nature, although the cause has not been confirmed, Beck said.

A lightning strike is believed to have caused a Saturday morning fire that damaged a nearly two centuries-old church. The fire at Emanuel Lutheran Church at 9416 Upper Strasburg Road was called in at 1:47 a.m., said Tom Rine, chief of the Pleasant Hall Volunteer Fire Co. Burn marks on the exterior of the building indicated that the fire might have been started by an electrical storm that passed through the area around midnight, he said. The bell tower of the church was burned and fire extended into the attic of the structure, making it necessary for firefighters to open holes in the roof to get to the fire, Rine said.

Devastated by a fire six months ago, M&K Market will reopen Wednesday with the same clean, fresh and friendly motto, and a few surprises. Owner Mark Schetrompt can’t wait to see the look on customers’ faces when the doors open at 8 a.m. Wednesday. “People have been calling and asking when we’re going to reopen,” Schetrompt said. “I said right away that I’m going to reopen. It’s going to take me time, but I’m going to reopen.” M&K Market, at 11359 Anthony Highway (Pa. 997)

A strong thunderstorm with accompanying lightning was being blamed for a fire that damaged an historic home in Chambersburg on Thursday night. Chambersburg's Emergency Services Chief William FitzGerald said a home at 411 Philadelphia Ave. in Chambersburg was struck by lightning, which ignited the cupola — a small structure on the top of a roof. When firefighters arrived shortly after 10:30 p.m., FitzGerald said, they saw smoke showing from the three-story brick and frame single-family home.

Fire causes extensive damage to W.Va. home HEDGESVILLE, W.Va. - A Tuesday morning house fire on Amethyst Lane in the Back Creek area may have started when a towel laying on top of a doll house caught fire, a fire official said. Stephanie Donelson told firefighters that her children had placed a towel over the doll house, which had an electric light inside, said Brett Minnick, chief of the Hedgesville Volunteer Fire Co. The 8:10 a.m. fire destroyed the top half of the two-story frame house at 186 Amethyst Lane and caused water damage to the first floor, Minnick said.

MERCERSBURG, Pa. - A lightning bolt started a fire that caused an estimated $300,000 in damage Saturday afternoon to Kiel Hall at Mercersburg Academy. Mercersburg Fire Chief Nick Barbuzanes said the fire was called in at 1:53 p.m. as thunderstorms were rolling through the region. He said it took about 45 minutes to knock down the major part of the fire and about an hour and a half to put it out. Barbuzanes said the upper floors of the five-story brick building contain dormitory rooms.

Approximately 15 to 20 patients and employees were evacuated from a section of Reeders Memorial Home on Sunday morning after an electrical short in a light fixture set off the sprinkler system, Boonsboro Fire Capt. Tommy Arnold said. No one was injured, Arnold said. Emergency services officials said the incident was reported at about 7:30 a.m. Sunday at the nursing home, which is at 141 S. Main Street in Boonsboro. The electrical short occurred in a light fixture in a residential patient room on the second floor, Arnold said.

Store owners thank firefighters, others for efforts To the editor: On Monday, Feb. 4, a five-alarm fire occurred in the building in which our business, L & J Liquors, is housed. The fire was fought by at least 20 engine companies and five ladder companies from Maryland and West Virginia. They were able to stop the spread of the fire before it reached our liquor store. As a result, instead of us dealing with a total loss of business, we are dealing mostly with smoke and water damage.

The bridges near Jersey City looked small because the rivers and bays were so swollen with water. The neighborhoods of the normally bustling city were eerily quiet because of a night-time curfew. Many residents were running out of their medications. These were the scenes that greeted emergency personnel from Washington County who were sent to New Jersey to help those affected by Superstorm Sandy. Five members of the Community Rescue Service returned to Washington County about noon Friday and were greeted with pizza, cake and hugs from colleagues and family members at their station on Eastern Boulevard.

Students in the Tuscarora School District will have school today for the first time all week. Power was restored to the last of the district's buildings Thursday afternoon, Tuscarora School Board member Chris Ardinger said. “We realize trees and things like that could still be down in some areas, but we're going to let it up to the individual parents whether to send their students or not. Students are permitted to get on the bus elsewhere if they are staying at other houses,” he said.

Twelve residents at Stonecroft Apartments independent living community were moved to the American Red Cross Thursday morning after a water main break occurred at the apartments while authorities were conducting a test on the facility's sprinkler system, officials said. Red Cross officials received a call about 10 a.m. about the water main break at the apartments on Stonecroft Court off Robinwood Drive, said Doug Lent, spokesman for the American Red Cross of the Chesapeake Region. The 12 residents were moved to the Red Cross at 1131 Conrad Court shortly after that, Lent said.

The National Weather Service confirmed Saturday that straight-line winds not a tornado damaged the Mercersburg Printing building off Pa. 16 in Franklin County Friday night. Weather service meteorologist John LaCorte said thunderstorms caused localized winds that damaged Mercersburg Printing at 9964 Buchanan Trail West, Mercersburg. Straight-line winds knock everything down in the same direction,  whereas a tornado will cause chaotic damage  - some trees will go one way and others in another direction, LaCorte said.

Emergency resolution passed for repairs to building CHAMBERSBURG, Pa. - The Franklin County (Pa.) Commissioners on Thursday passed an emergency resolution that will allow for repairs and cleanup following a May 17 fire in their building. Sparks from demolition of an adjacent building ignited the commissioners' office building at 14 N. Main St. The second-floor meeting room and two offices sustained “extensive water damage,” County Administrator John Hart said Thursday.

Artifacts from a centuries-old house that once survived wrecking equipment avoided burning in a fire that ripped through their storage facility late Saturday. Wooden beams and stones from Mercersburg's dismantled Smith House were being stored in an old tire and auto shop on Pa. 16 across from the MMP&W Fire Co. Fire heavily damaged the storage building overnight Saturday. “I couldn't believe it,” said Paul Orange, a Franklin County, Pa., doctor who owns the artifacts. In February 2011, the Smith House was demolished to expand the fire department's lot. Demolition capped off an 18-month struggle between the firefighters who owned the property and preservationists who wanted the house preserved.

A lightning strike is believed to have caused a Saturday morning fire that damaged a nearly two centuries-old church. The fire at Emanuel Lutheran Church at 9416 Upper Strasburg Road was called in at 1:47 a.m., said Tom Rine, chief of the Pleasant Hall Volunteer Fire Co. Burn marks on the exterior of the building indicated that the fire might have been started by an electrical storm that passed through the area around midnight, he said. The bell tower of the church was burned and fire extended into the attic of the structure, making it necessary for firefighters to open holes in the roof to get to the fire, Rine said.

Fire companies battled a house fire at 13731 Mercersburg Road in Clear Spring early Tuesday. None of the nine residents of the two-story duplex was injured, said Charlie Mundey, deputy chief of the Clear Spring Volunteer Fire Co. Units were called to the fire at 3:41 a.m., a supervisor for Washington County Emergency Services said. Mundey said when firefighters arrived, the attic on one side of the duplex was engulfed in flames. Mundey said the fire was contained by 4:30 a.m. and firefighters left the scene around 7:15 a.m. From the outside, damage could be seen on one side of the two-story home, and two windows were missing.