Suspicious fire, explosion destroys 3 houses in N. Toledo

Cindy Schulz watched as Toledo city workers razed her home early Monday morning after a fire and explosion that left it and two vacant North Toledo houses structurally unsound.

Schulz initially attempted to stop the demolition, and Toledo police officers were called. Eventually, the demolition resumed and Schulz watched from across the street.

“Now they’re destroying everything I own,” she said. “They didn’t have to do this.”

The fire was reported at about 1:45 a.m. on Monday in a house in the 1800 block of Champlain Street, said Pvt. Sterling Rahe, spokesman for the Toledo Fire & Rescue Department. Within the first few minutes of the dispatch, reports of a possible explosion came in.

By the time firefighters arrived at the scene, the fire was fully involved, Private Rahe said.

“(The structure) looked like it had collapsed,” he said.

Crews were able to start putting water on the fire immediately, he said, but the fire spread to two other homes and damaged them in such a way that they had to come down, according to city inspectors. Two firefighters were transported to Mercy Health St. Vincent Medical Center with minor injuries, and a third firefighter was treated for a minor injury on scene.

The fire is considered suspicious, Rahe said, and officials are still investigating. He added that neighbors reported that the vacant houses saw a lot of drug activity.

Columbia Gas workers were also on scene checking the gas lines in the area and making sure there was no damage or leaks in any of the lines, Rahe said.

Schulz doesn’t know what she’s going to do now.

She wasn’t allowed to go back inside before the house was razed. She has no clothes, she said. She has nothing.

“I just wanted to get what I could salvage,” she said. “They’re destroying everything I have that is salvageable.”