If you walk down Cactus Drive in midtown Billings, you might smell the smoky remains of a Thursday night house fire.
When the home caught on fire, neighbors rushed outside to see what the commotion was about.
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One neighbor, Oly Olson, relives what he saw.
“I stood up and looked and I saw the neighbors… (in) the house (that) was burning come out of their house and, you know, heading out. And so I went out my front porch, and as soon as I walked around the corner, I could see the garage up in flames,” he said.
Olson says other neighbors came out of their houses to support the family whose house was burning. He used his own garden hose to prevent the flames from spreading while fire crews were on their way to the location.
“I just dropped everything and got a garden hose and started spraying, trying to protect as much as we could before the fire trucks got there,” he said.
Olson experienced a temporary power outage as the fire damaged power lines. He says the outage lasted until about 10:30 that night.
A smoky smell still lingered in the area Friday afternoon, spreading to nearby properties.
“I even asked my neighbor, I said, ‘Does your house smell like smoke?’ Because mine was terrible,” Olson said.
The Billings Fire Department is investigating the cause of the fire and total damages.
The camper trailer is beyond repair, but crews were able to stop the fire from spreading through the entire house.
