Shop fire ignites on election day

The village of Orchard's shop building went up in flames Tuesday afternoon, Nov. 3.

Firefighters from Orchard and Royal responded to a call of a structure fire about 10 minutes before 4 p.m.

The shop building is located directly behind the structure where the village office is located at 230 Windom St.

Orchard Fire Chief Duane Risinger said the fire was "about two hose lengths away from the fire hall."

An incident command vehicle from the Neligh Volunteer Fire Department also responded to the scene. There were no injuries reported.

Risinger noted he was almost certain a welding spark was the cause of the blaze that badly burned the building.

Orchard Utilities Supervisor Bruce Horstmann noted he been doing some wire-welding work by himself inside the shop structure until leaving it at about 3:30 p.m.

"I was actually doing a little welding about 3 o'clock," he said. "I had looked around and there was nothing going.

"How do you know, though, I guess?" he said. "I don't know if that's what started it."

Horstmann received a call while he was at the village office about smoke coming out of the doors of the shop structure.

"I was in there about 10, 15 minutes earlier and everything was fine," he said. "I went into the office and sat down and somebody called me.

"There was just smoke at that time," he said. "When I pushed the door open, it was all just dark. You couldn't see anything."

Horstmann, who had not dealt with anything like the fire in his roughly 15 years as the Orchard utility supervisor, hit the fire siren in a hurry to summon firefighters to the scene.

An insurance adjuster was on site Friday, Nov. 6, at the burned building.

Risinger mentioned a skid loader located inside the structure may be salvageable.

"I'm sure the building isn't salvageable," he said. "There was a lot of equipment in it."

Many onlookers watched firefighters spray water onto the blaze and tear down the building's garage doors and walls as smoke billowed into the air.

The fire occurred at a time of day during which the outside temperature was in the low 80s and the blue sky was clear.

Many people were coming and going through the area, especially as voting was going on at the nearby fire hall during the 2020 general election.

Voting continued while firefighters were on scene.