Vehicle Fire Threatened Commercial Building

Photo Courtesy of Frank Pate Photography

The East Ridge Fire Department is investigating the cause of a Saturday afternoon camper fire in a parking lot that threatened a commercial building.

According to ERFD Chief Mike Williams, fire and police were dispatched to 5304 Ringgold Rd. at 5 p.m. on a camper fire that threatened a business. Units arrived on scene to find heavy fire and smoke coming from a camper about eight feet from Brea Bakery.

Chief Williams said firefighters made an aggressive attack, while other personnel evacuated people from the inside the bakery.

The origin and cause of the fire are under investigation, Chief Williams said.

About Dick Cook

Dick Cook has lived in East Ridge since the Kennedy Administration when his parents bought a house on Marietta Street. Dick graduated from ERHS in 1976 before going on to the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga where he studied Political Science. Dick worked for the Chattanooga Free-Press and the Chattanooga Times Free Press for 22 years. Free-Press Sports Editor Roy Exum plucked him out of production in 1989 and gave him a job as a sports reporter. Dick covered everything from prep sports to the whitewater events on the Ocoee River for the 1996 Olympics. When Chattanooga's two paper's merged, he became the Crime Reporter covering both the Chattanooga Police and Fire Departments. He was among reporters who were honored by the Associated Press for the TFP's coverage of the 2002 fog-shrouded crash on I-75 in Catoosa County, Dick and his wife, Cathy, live on Marlboro Avenue where they are seen frequently chasing around their three grandsons.