Crews demolish Rostraver house to extinguish fire

Firefighters used heavy equipment to demolish a burning house in Rostraver Township Friday morning, according to the Rostraver Central Fire Department.

The fire on Tyrol Boulevard started just before 3 a.m.

Nobody was living at the house, which was used as a storage facility for nearby business Equipment Connection.

Nobody was hurt.

Firefighters had the blaze under control within an hour, but flames continued to burn inside, said Justin Shawley, assistant chief of Rostraver Central Fire Department.

Firefighters were unable to get inside the building because of all the furniture, tents and other objects stores inside, Shawley said.

“It was stacked floor to ceiling with those items, which made it pretty much impossible to do anything but a defensive attack,” he said.“As we would knock down the fire outside there were areas inside the building that we couldn’t get to.”

Crews used construction equipment to demolish the building and extinguish the fire, finishing the fight around 8:30 a.m.

A state police fire marshal will investigate the fire. The cause could not be immediately determined.