Investigators look for answers after toddler dies in house fire
BENTON COUNTY, Tenn. — Officials confirmed a three-year old is dead after a house fire on Wednesday.
“It makes you stop and ask yourself. ‘Why?’ All the crazy stuff going on in this world, and then stuff like this happened,” said Benton County Sheriff Kenny Christopher.
Christopher says the fire started around 8 p.m. on Sunburst Lane in the Holladay area.
A man and woman lived in the trailer with three children.
“It was pretty much rolling whenever we got the call on it. I think response time might have been 10 minutes or so. When they got there, South-40 Fire Department was on scene,” Christopher said.
Christopher says there was confusion at the scene, and the parents thought all the children were accounted for.
“Eleven, nine, and three, if my information is correct. A few minutes later, they realized that the youngest one — the three-year-old — did not make it out of the house,” Christopher said.
Owen Conway, with the South of 40 Fire Department, says by the time they arrived, the trailer was 70% engulfed.
They put out the blaze and found the child’s body.
“We got TBI to come in, that’s more their expertise with the death of a small child like this. It’s tragic. We want to make sure that everything was done properly,” Christopher said.
The investigation is still ongoing, and the trailer is an almost complete loss.
“There was no electricity to the house and there was no water to the house, according to neighbors. So they’re really not sure what started it,” Christopher said.
The officials investigating the case just want answers.
“Last night I sat on the couch, just thinking, ‘My God, what did that little fella go through, you know?'” Christopher said.
The Red Cross says they are assisting the family and are helping them stay in a hotel nearby.
