SPENCER - Crews spent a good portion of Saturday morning and afternoon battling a 4-alarm fire on Sherry Lane in Spencer.

Spencer Fire Chief Robert Parsons says the fire was started when a homeowner was attempting to clean out his wood stove, and he put the ashes from the stove in a paper bag. The bag then caught fire, setting fire to the garage and home.

Crews responded around 9:30 AM on Saturday to heavy fire and heavy smoke. The garage is a total loss, and there is significant damage to the home, but the department is not sure if the home is a total loss yet.

Chief Parsons said it took a few minutes for them to get to the actual location of the fire, and one of the problems was it was difficult to get water to the actual scene.

"This area of town, there are no hydrants, no water supply out here. We have to bring our own out on wheels. We had a problem initially. A couple of the tankers that we called for didn't respond because they had issues going on in their own communities,” Parsons said.

“We had water on the fire very quickly, but we didn't have enough to do what we needed to do for the amount of fire we had. Once we got a good water supply established, we were able to go back into the main house. It looks like we kept it out of the main house as much as we could, other than the attic space," he added.

There were no injuries to civilians or firefighters. The homeowners and their two dogs were able to escape as well.​