Fire damaged a West Street home this morning, but all the family members were found to be safe after an initial scare.
The fire at 721 West St. started a little before 8:30 a.m., after both James and Angie Cahoone had left for work. But when Angie Cahoone got the call, her first thought was of her 10-year-old son, Xavier. Had he left for school yet?
“He leaves between 8 and 8:15 and I leave at 7:30, so I didn’t know,” she said. “I about had a wreck coming over here. I probably took 10 different streets to get here because the cars in front of me wouldn’t move fast enough.”
Anxiety turned to relief when she found out Xavier was already at nearby Walnut Elementary School when the fire started.
“It’s OK,” she said. “He’s OK. That’s all that matters.”
The Cahoone’s other children were already known to be out of the house. Wyatt, 4, had been taken to preschool and 14-year-old Heidi was at Emporia High School.
Firefighters were still investigating the cause of the fire, which seemed to have started in the boys’ bedroom. The bedroom and an area under the stairs were directly damaged by the flames, while the rest of the house suffered smoke damage.