Passer-by alerts homeowner to pole barn fire in Polk

Julio Crespo was in his house Saturday evening when he heard a horn blaring and then someone pounding on the door of his home in Gilbert.

It was a Pleasant Valley security guard who had been driving by on Route 209 and spotted his pole barn on fire.

“He said, ‘Your garage is on fire,’ ” Crespo said at the scene.

Crespo looked out and saw the blaze and grabbed his dogs and got out of the house.

His wife and 90-year-old mother-in-law were not home at the time. Fire swept through a Polk Township pole barn, destroying Crespo’s truck, lawn tractor and painting supplies.

Crespo operates Helping Hands Home Services, a painting and handyman service. He doesn’t know what started the blaze, but Polk Township Fire Chief Billy Tippett said it wasn’t suspicious.

Crespo said he put his lawn tractor away about an hour before the fire broke out. He lost his Toyota Tacoma truck and all his business supplies, ladders and paint.

He is fully insured, he said.

“It’s all replaceable,” he said. “My wife and mother-in-law are OK.”

He remained calm at the scene.

“I have to keep my eye on the big picture,” he said. “My customers are not in the fire. They are in their homes. I am still in business.”

Tippett said the structure was fully involved when firefighters arrived. Additional fire companies were immediately dispatched because Polk fire trucks had to come over the bridge that is under construction in Kresgeville.

“Initially we just need to get everyone here,” Tippett said.

Assisting Polk were Kunkletown, West End and Blue Ridge fire companies in Monroe County and Franklin, Towamensing and Penn Forest No. 1 and 2 from Carbon County. State police from Lehighton were also at the scene.

Two firefighters were treated at the scene for heat exhaustion, Tippett said.

Firefighters were able to keep the blaze from spreading to Crespo’s home and the trailer where his mother-in-law lives.

Sections of Route 209, from Burger Hollow to Gilbert Road, were closed to traffic.