A 53-year-old woman was found dead inside her Battle Ground manufactured home that was engulfed in flames Monday night.
Penny Davis died from smoke inhalation, according to the Clark County Medical Examiner’s Office. She’s listed in county property records as the owner of the residence.
Clark County Fire & Rescue was dispatched to 300 S.W. Seventh Ave. at 11:24 p.m. and arrived to find the single-wide manufactured home “fully involved” in flame, according to Battalion Chief Tim Dawdy.
Firefighters attacked the fire and knocked down the flames and then quickly searched the residence, where they found Davis, who had already died.
While the house was located only a few blocks from the Clark County Fire & Rescue’s Battle Ground station, other factors made the blaze difficult.
“It was a single-wide, older manufactured home, and they burn notoriously hot and fast because of the lightweight construction,” Dawdy said.
He said that the house was also cluttered, which added fuel to the blaze and “that much harder to extinguish.”
The most probable cause of the fire was improper use of a wood stove, according to Clark County Assistant Fire Marshal Richard Martin.
Martin said that part of the problem appeared to be that there were items stored close to the stove.
The damage estimate to the structure and contents was estimated at $80,000.
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