A De Soto-area man was working on a tractor Oct. 27 when it caught fire and spread to the metal building that housed it, destroying the shed and all its contents. The 40-by-60-foot metal shed is at 2652 Flucom Road.
Gerald Jung, 79, had just put gasoline in the tractor, walked around it and set the gas can down “when he heard a poof, and turned around and everything was on fire,” his wife, Winona Jung, said.
Gerald said the tractor was not running at the time.
At 3:39 p.m., De Soto Rural Fire Protection District got a call about the fire. By the time firefighters arrived about 10 minutes later, the man was safely out of the shed and the whole building was in flames, Assistant Chief Tom Fitzgerald said.
“The building was fully engulfed and the trees and woods around the (shed) were burning,” he said.
The fire burned about a half acre before it was put out, Fitzgerald said.
Fitzgerald said the man was winterizing some antique tractors housed in the shed “when something happened with the fuel to catch the tractor on fire.”
“That tractor caught the barn and everything else on fire,” Fitzgerald said.
“It was an accidental fire,” he said.
Gerald was transported by the Joachim-Plattin Ambulance District to Mercy Hospital Jefferson in Crystal City, Fitzgerald said.
Winona said Gerald was not hurt but was sent to the hospital “for safety’s sake.”
He was checked out and then returned home, she said.
Fitzgerald said the shed contained several antique tractors, vehicles, tools and machinery.
“I think there was quite a value to what he had in that barn, and it was all destroyed,” Fitzgerald said.
“We lost everything,” Winona added.
She said, however, the family has insurance that will cover the loss.
Firefighters had the blaze put out in about 30 minutes.
The Jefferson R-7, Hematite, Hillsboro and Potosi fire protection districts and the Festus, Goose Creek Lake and Lake Timberline fire departments, along with Big River Fire in Bonne Terre, helped with the call. The Joachim-Plattin Ambulance District also responded, Fitzgerald said.