Crews put out fire at South Charleston Community Center

SOUTH CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A fire was reported at the South Charleston Community Center Tuesday evening.

According to South Charleston fire chief Virgil White, a towel caught fire at approximately 6:10 p.m. in the center’s sauna room. White confirmed that the fire was contained, and no injuries were reported.

When crews arrived, it was believed the fire had been put out, but firefighters still had flames to attack.

“They thought they had the fire out. When we arrived on the scene, we did have fire in the women’s sauna room, so we immediately started fire suppression activities,” White said.

After the flames were extinguished, South Charleston firefighters transitioned to a ventilation effort.

“The building sustained a lot of smoke throughout, so we had to do a lot of ventilation to get the smoke out of the building,” White said.

White says the sauna room was the only area affected.

“The main damage is just to the sauna room,” White said. “The smoke, we’ve got it all cleared. We’ve checked for extensions, which there were none, it was all confined to the sauna room.”

White also says the response time from crews made a difference.

“From the time of the call to the time we were on scene was three minutes,” White said.