Truck Fire Nearly Catches Kort’s Korner Ablaze

A pickup caught fire and nearly burned down Kort’s Korner convenience store south of La Grange on Monday.

La Grange Volunteer Fire Department got the call around 1:30 p.m. when a white Ford super duty pickup caught fire while parked in front of the store.

Local carpenter Justin Coufal was working on a house near Kort’s Korner when he saw the smoke. He and a coworker ran over to help. About that time, La Grange Fire Chief Frank Menefee showed up in his command vehicle. Coufal and another bystander helped hook up some chains to the bumper of the burning truck and Menefee pulled it away from the building.

Their efforts likely averted a major disaster. Not only was the building about to catch fire, but the burning truck had been parked next to a cage full of propane bottles.

“It could have been really bad,” Coufal said.

La Grange fire trucks arrived soon afterwards and doused the burning truck. They then turned their attention to the building, which suffered some smoke and heat damage. Menefee sent a team of firefighters inside the building with thermal imaging equipment to check wall cavities for heat. Thankfully, they found no sign of fire inside the building. Heat from the fire damaged one of the outside ice coolers and a portion of the parking lot.

“After inspecting the building, we were able to determine there was no damage to anything but the ice machines in the front,” said Menefee.

There were no injuries.

The driver of the pickup, which had Oklahoma license plates, declined to speak to the newspaper. Menefee said the fire appeared to have started from a fuel leak in the engine compartment.

Firefighters left the scene around 2:48 p.m.