Smoke empties nursing home

Smoke empties nursing home

Passersby see fire trucks, offer cars to keep residents warm

With light snow fallingand temperatures hovering around 33 degrees fahrenheit, Apple Valley Assisted Living residents evacuated Tuesday afternoon after smoke seeped into a residence hallway. Charles City residents and emergency response teams weren’t going to leave them in the cold for long.

“People passing by saw us and pulled over,” offering to let the residents warm up inside their cars, Administrator Terri Cosselman said. Employees at nearby Eggert, Erb & Mulcahy Plc. offered to let residents warm up inside their office, and police and firefighters opened up squad cars in the parking lot.

“It was so cool. They would just holler and ask,” Cosselman said. “It was a really good thing to see how much people work together, right here in our parking lot.”

With the help of the police department and Apple Valley employees, the fire department evacuated residents into a waiting car for about 20 minutes before they were allowed back in the building.

“We did have a bus from Charles City Transit come up, just in case we needed to get people…out of the elements and into somewhere warm,” Fire Chief Eric Whipple said.

A burned-up furnace motor caused light smoke in the building, Whipple said.

“Everything went smoothly, thankfully we didn’t have anything major that was wrong. We could let people back in in a timely manner,” Whipple said.

By Kate Hayden khayden@charlescitypress.com