Nobody was home but the dog -- PF&R put out the fire, and saved the dog. The house was likely a total loss

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Thick dark smoke started billowing from a small house at 5934 S.E. Malden Street on at about 1:48 p.m. on Thursday, November 12. After a call to 9-1-1, Portland Fire & Rescue (PF&R) crews were dispatched.

"I saw all the smoke coming out of the house across the street, after someone banged on my door, went outside and hooked up my garden hose – but fire trucks started pulling up," a neighbor told THE BEE, acknowledging that water from her hose would have been of little use against the sudden inferno.

The first of six rigs in, Woodstock Fire Station 25's Engine Company reported back to dispatchers seeing "heavy smoke and fire showing from all sides of the structure" as they rolled in.

As these firefighters prepared to enter the burning house, Westmoreland Station 20's Engine Company had hooked a water line up to a hydrant a block north, on S.E. Flavel Street, and deployed it from the back of the truck as they pulled in.

Four minutes later, Woodstock Station 25's Ladder Truck Company followed in; these firefighters scrambled up ladders to the roof, chainsaws in hand, to begin cutting vertical ventilation holes into the attic, so hot toxic gases to escape from the 816 sq. ft. residence, which had been built in 1942.

By about 2 p.m. the fire had been substantially knocked down. Ambulance paramedics were standing by with a gurney, in case any fire victims were found – but it turned out that the occupants had not been at home at the time.

At 3:14 p.m. a PF&R official reported, "Investigators are at the scene of the house fire. Crews were able to rescue one dog, and provide medical care. No one else was in the home, and the dog is doing well." The cause of the fire has not yet been announced, but the damage to the house appeared to be sufficient to make it uninhabitable.