Police Crawl Through Smoky Kitchen to Douse Flames: Maple Grove Fire Report

Maple Grove police helped to stop a kitchen fire that broke out at a home on the 11200 block of 97th Avenue North, according to Fire Department reports.

Dispatchers received a report of the fire at 11:45 a.m. Aug. 16. Police officers arrived on scene first. They were followed later by firefighters from Maple Grove Stations No. 2 and No. 3 and Osseo went to the home.

The homeowner said grease in an open fry pan caught fire while cooking on the stove. The homeowner tried to control the fire by placing a pan cover over the flaming pan and then threw baking soda on it when the cover didn’t work. But increasing smoke eventually forced the homeowner to leave the home.

Police officers crawled into the kitchen under smoke and used a fire extinguisher to put out the flames.

Firefighters arrived and opened windows to ventilate smoke, removed a microwave that had significant heat damage and pulled the oven away from the wall. They used a thermal imaging camera to see if there were any hidden flames but didn’t find anything.

The kitchen had fire damage on the wall behind the stove and significant smoke damage throughout the main floor of the home. Firefighters advised the homeowners not to stay inside the home because of health concerns from the smoke.

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Other Fire Department activity between Aug. 12 and Aug. 18 includes:

• Unauthorized burning at 12:28 a.m. Aug. 12 on Robin Road,
• Burnt food at 76th Avenue North at 7:29 a.m. Aug. 12,
• Two cooking fires that were confined to the container—one at 10:57 a.m. Aug. 12 on Grove Drive and another at 2:54 p.m. Aug. 13 on 96th Ave. N.,
• A gasoline or other flammable spill at 7:13 p.m. Aug. 12 on Fountains Drive,
• Three gas leaks,
• Two smoke detector activations due to a malfunction and a third smoke detector activation that was unintentional and
• Two special outside fires.