Cause of fire still unknown; victim’s name is released
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A Rocky Top firefighter uses a booster hose to spray water on a hot spot remaining from last Tuesday’s (Jan. 23) fire that destroyed this building at 319 S. Main St., resulting in a fatality. There were five apartments on the second floor. - G. Chambers Williams III
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This two-story warehouse/apartment building in downtown Rocky Top was reduced to rubble by a fire that broke out early Tuesday, Jan. 23. This is what the building’s remains looked like from South Main Street on Saturday morning. - G. Chambers Williams III
As of Monday, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation was still investigating a fatal fire that destroyed a large downtown building with a first-floor warehouse and five second-story apartments on Jan. 23.
“TBI special agent fire investigators are working alongside the Rocky Top Police Department and the Rocky Top Fire Department in investigating a fire that occurred on Jan. 23 at an apartment building in the 300 block of South Main Street,” the TBI said in an email to The Courier News.
“One person was found deceased inside the building,” the TBI said.
“The individual has been identified as Danny Cecil Parks (DOB: 3/19/55). At this time, the investigation into the cause of the fire remains active and ongoing.”
On Saturday morning, the Fire Department was back on the scene spraying more water on what remained of the building, which had mostly collapsed.
The two-story building, at 319 S. Main St., was built in 1925, according to Anderson County property records. Those records show the owners as Wilford L. Johnson and Carl Johnson, but both men died several years ago. No change of ownership has been recorded since they died in 2021 and 2019, respectively.
Firefighters from at least nine departments were on the scene fighting the fire most of the day Tuesday. The fire was reported at 3:56 a.m.
Rocky Top Police Chief John Thomas told The Courier News that firefighters had to rescue several people from the apartments on the second floor of the building, which is next door to the new Coal Creek General Store.
Some residents gave harrowing accounts of waking up to flames shooting out of vents into their apartments shortly before 4 a.m., and waking up other residents to try to get everyone safely out of the building.
Parks, who was known to many by his nickname, “Horse,” reportedly had safely exited the building, but died after he went back in to check for anyone else who might have been still inside.
“Rocky Top fire got the call at 3:56 a.m., and got here before the building was fully involved with fire, and got the residents out,” Thomas said Tuesday morning. “About eight people were displaced.”
Donations of clothing and personal items for those displaced by the fire were collected at Coal Creek General Store and across the street at Coal Creek Coffee, and distributed to the victims of the fire on Saturday, according to social media posts.
“We still have no information on the cause or origin,” Thomas said on Tuesday morning (Jan. 23) . “We do have the TBI on the scene to help with the investigation.”
Flames were still visible, shooting out the side of the building at 9 a.m. that morning, as firefighters from Clinton were spraying water on the top of the building from the Clinton Fire Department’s big ladder truck.
Thomas said the first floor of the building was being used as a warehouse, and all the apartments were on the second floor.
Besides Rocky Top and Clinton, other fire departments on the scene included Ridgewood, Medford, Caryville, LaFollette, Briceville, Marlow and Andersonville.
The fire did not spread to any other structures. The building that burned is separated from Coal Creek General Store by a parking lot, but another building, on the north side, is separated from the burned building by a very narrow space.
Thomas said that space, plus the brick construction of the two buildings, protected the adjacent building from the fire.
