Blaze levels barn

It took two volunteer fire departments to extinguish a barn fire Thursday afternoon.

The Cedar Bluffs Fire Department was called at about 12:30 p.m. to the barn in the 2600 block of County Road 13, Chief Rob Benke said.

“A farmer was burning trees out in the field and a wind change threw an ember into his barn,” Benke said.

He said the structure was a large barn that had been in good shape before the fire destroyed it.

“It was gone before we left Cedar,” Benke said. “When we turned on the highway from Cedar, we could see the flames and smoke. There was a pretty big fireball coming out of that building. Most of it was gone when we got there.”

When firefighters arrived, he said they were just trying to get the fire out because the building was too far gone to save. The Fremont Rural Fire Department was called in so there would be more tankers to fight the fire, Benke said.

Nobody was in the building, but there were some 55-gallon drums of oil inside that fueled the fire. There also was a 1,000-gallon diesel fuel tank about 50 feet from the barn that firefighters had to make sure stayed cool.

The fire was out in about 90 minutes, Benke said.