Lightning Strike fire in Buffton

Bluffton Fire fights in Farm Credit Service building caused by lightning strike (35 images)

A lightning storm went through Bluffton, Indiana about 4:23pm on June 9th and apparently it struck the Farm Credit Services office in Bluffton. The employees heard the load boom and lost power. They all thought their tree in front of the building had been hit. A couple went out to look and saw nothing damaged, but were chased back into the office by a downpour.
Bluffton Firefighter Brad Evans was doing some banking in a nearby bank and saw smoke coming from the Credit Service attic, put in an alarm and evacuated the people from the building. As the first in engines arrived they saw smoke and flames coming from the attic vents and eves. Incident commander Captain Matt Markley sized up the scene and requested mutual aid from Ossian Fire Dept.
While firefighters vented the roof , others did an interior attack. The interior crew were able to move the main frame and other material out of the building. With so much fire in the attic it quickly became unsafe to have interior firefighting and the evauation alarm was sounded and it became a "surround and drown attack."
There were no injuries and though the building is probably a total loss, most records were in fire proof vaults and backed up at corporate offices.