Motor Home Fire Spreads to El Cajon Building

A fire that grew from a motor home spread to a nearby commercial building in El Cajon Monday evening.

The flames started in an outside storage area at 1444 Pioneer Way at about 6:50 p.m.

But when Heartland Fire crews arrived on scene, they saw heavy fire coming from several vehicles under a metal carport and neighboring buildings.

"We upgraded this incident to a second alarm because we had difficulty accessing the actual fire because power lines were down and they had energized the fence that was surrounding the structure," said Heartland Battalion Chief Ted Kakuris.

They avoided the fence that blocked the north side of the property to prevent electrocution.

SDG&E helped cut the power in about 10 minutes, so firefighters were finally able to go into the building. They controlled the fire within 30 minutes. 

The motor home, several vehicles, machinery, gasoline and oils were among the items burned in the blaze.

The couple of people living in the home have not been located, Kakuris said. Officials don't believe they were on site during the fire.

The cause has not been determined.

Editor's note: A previous version of this story cited information from the city of El Cajon that a deli was on fire. Firefighters later corrected that information and said the deli was not affected. Also, the fire was not at Clancy's 24-Hour Towing Yard, but near it. No vehicles there were damaged by the fire.

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