(Connie Nashton, Austin Steinberg & Tim King of T&T Tool are joined by WCAHS President Vicki Shaffer)
At the same time the Washburn County Area Humane Society’s building was just starting to burn, two employees of T& T Tool company, located adjacent to the shelter, were starting their cars to warm them up before they left their second shift jobs at 1:00 am on Thursday morning. March 16, 2017.
Austin Steinburg and Connie Nashton saw the flames and jumped into action.
They ran into their building and found a third employee, Tim King. King grabbed 2 fire extinguishers and handed them to Austin while he was still phoning 911.
As the three of them ran to the animal shelter, they realized their fire extinguishers were of no use due to the size of the flames and within minutes the Washburn County Sheriff deputies and Spooner Police Department were on the scene and entered the building with Austin and Tim right behind.
Due to the thick smoke it was difficult to see anything, but Tim was able to grab a large dog, a Tree Walker Hound named Charlie, by its collar and led it out. Austin found and grabbed the leashes, not knowing how many dogs there were to rescue. He grabbed a cat and ran out of the building.
("Charlie")
The fire department was there by then and immediately started pumping water onto the blaze. After the fire was pretty well out, more cats and another dog, a bull dog named Jenny, were rescued.
("Jenny")
At this point the timbers in the burned building were deemed unsafe and all the animals that were alive were taken out and taken to the Spooner Vet Clinic nearby.
In the morning the 2 dogs and the 10 cats were taken to the Hayward Animal Shelter and surrendered. All except Charlie, he had recently been adopted and was waiting for his new owner to come home from vacation and was only staying in Spooner until that time.
The fire spread rapidly in the twenty minutes starting shortly before 1:00 am and all three rescuers said the timing couldn’t have been better for them to be leaving work and seeing the flames to call the authorities and save the animals.
Austin is a three year employee of T&T Tool, Connie Nashton, a seven year employee and Tim King has been there for over fifteen years.
The six board members of the WCAHS will be meeting soon now that the fire investigator has made an inspection looking for the cause of the blaze. The Spooner Police Department issued a press release on March 20, 2017, announcing that the cause of the fire has been deemed accidental.
The building looks to be a total loss and because the shelter receives funding from the county, a new facility will have to be found or built; it remains to be seen at this time what they will decide or who will be the new director, now that Penny Dunn, a fifteen year employee, has retired.
Last Update: Mar 21, 2017 11:31 am CDT
