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Former township councilman Tucker Kelley told DailyVoice.com that he immediately sprung to action after getting a Monday morning call from longtime friend Mike Lynch stating that he and his girlfriend’s home in Lake Telemark had gone up in flames and that he was having trouble reaching 911.
Kelley quickly drove to 34 Whippoorwill Ln. from his own home just two blocks away and found that the front of it was completely engulfed in incredibly hot flames.
Kelley called back Lynch, who confirmed that though the children and their mother had safely exited the home and gone to a neighbor’s, his grandmother, Oddfrid Tokle, was still inside.
After determining which room Lynch’s grandmother was in, Kelley went around toward the back of the home and tried to use a construction ladder he saw to climb inside.
“I grabbed the ladder, and I prop it into where the window is, but the house was so g****** hot, I just couldn’t get up there, there was just no way,” he said.
A short time later, fire crews arrived and tried to break a window to access Tokle’s bedroom, but to no avail.
“By that time…the house was so hot that there was no way she was alive,” he said.
Later, the roof of the home collapsed onto the second story, which made the structure crumble into the basement, where Tokle’s body was found, Kelly said.
Now, Lynch, his girlfriend, Sarah, and their three children ages two, four, and 11, must rebuild their lives while coping with the devastating loss of Tokle, who Kelley describes as a “pillar of the community.”
“Everybody knew her,” he said. “She had so many relatives in the community because they’re all connected through her heritage. The Tokles were a ‘name brand’ in Lake Telemark.”
Meanwhile, nearly $20,000 had been raised on GoFundMe in less than 24 hours for the family’s recovery funds.
“The whole family is at a complete loss for words and grief-stricken to say the least,” reads the fundraiser, launched by Ted Potter, husband of Lynch’s sister, Emily.
Kelley is also collecting clothing, diapers, gift cards, and other essential resources for the family, he said in a Facebook post accompanied by several of his own terrifying photos and video clips of the massive blaze.
“…This family lost everything, plus life,” Kelley told Daily Voice. “They have nothing. Any money that they may have stored in the house or put aside, or pictures…are all gone. They’ll never get that back, ever.”
Click here to view/donate to ‘Tragic Fire Burns Family's Home to the Ground’ on GoFundMe.
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