4 adults, 2 children killed in house fire

ALCOA, Tenn. — Four adults and two children were killed Sunday morning in a house fire that Alcoa Fire Department Chief Roger Robinson called the worst tragedy he’s seen in his 39-year career with the city.

Twenty-nine firefighters responded to the single-story home at 885 N. Wright Road after someone called E-911 to report the blaze at 5:24 a.m.

Crews began battling “heavy fire conditions,” and within five to eight minutes, the flames “were brought under control enough to do search and rescue,” Robinson said at a news conference on Sunday afternoon.

Firefighters found two people dead inside the home. They rescued another four people from the burning house, Robinson said. Alcoa police officers joined emergency medical service workers in performing CPR on the victims.

Two of the victims were taken to the University of Tennessee Medical Center and two were taken to William Blount Memorial Hospital, Robinson said.

“Unfortunately, there were no survivors.”

Authorities at the news conference didn’t release the identities or ages of the victims. Autopsies will be performed to determine their causes of death, according to Alcoa Police Department Detective Sgt. Kris Sanders.

Authorities offered no details about where the fire started or what may have sparked it.

That investigation will be a “pretty methodical process” that will involve Alcoa Fire Marshal Colin Hurst and an arson investigator from the Blount County Sheriff’s Office, Sanders said.

“It’s not something that’s going to wrap up in a couple days,” he said. “It’s something that we’ll work on for the next several days to try to bring some type of answer that we can give to the family.”

The house is owned by Shirley Roulette of Maryville, who said she rented it for many years to a woman. After the woman died, her daughter moved in with other people.