Heating-related fire strikes Hall home

GAINESVILLE - Hall County firemen report their first heating-related fire of the fall.

Fire marshal Scott Cagle says it happened about 8:00 Wednesday morning at 3248 Montgomery Drive, and was caused by combustibles placed too close to an electric heater.

Cagle says an elderly woman was rescued by a neighbor and was uninjured. The $90,000 house suffered about $30,000 worth of damage.

Cagle says "bags and bags of clothes" had been left "pretty much right up against" a wall-mounted heater, adding the house did not have smoke alarms, "so if this was at night, of course, this fire could have been much, much worse than it was."

The fire occurred just four days after Cagle issued a warning about the dangers of alternative methods of heating, including placing combustibles too close to such heaters.