Amity, PA -- Edna Ross sat in a lawn chair at the base of her driveway as she watched her home of 17 years burn away on a hill overlooking Vista Valley Road.
Consoled by family and neighbors, the 70-year-old South Franklin Township resident took solace in the fact that her family was not at home when the fire broke out at 1600 Vista Valley Road.
"We went out to lunch at Long John Silvers, came back and there wasn't any home to come back to," Edna Ross said.
She and her sister, Shirley Pattison, were cleaning the house before lunch when they decided to go out to eat with her son, Arthur Ross, 27.
"If he hadn't have went, he'd have been in that house," Edna Ross said.
Her other son, Bill Ross, 29, his wife, Shawna Harrington, and their two children, Trent, 5, and Willow, 2, also lived in the home.
Her family moved back into the old farm house owned by Consolidated Coal Co. after Edna Ross' husband, Henry Ross, died six years ago.
"She just couldn't stand living by herself," Pattison said.
Firefighters still were working to extinguish the smoldering structure at dusk and had no way of knowing yet what sparked the fire but Edna Ross believes the cause may have been electrical.
"I knew it was in bad shape with the wiring and stuff but I never thought it would be burning when we got back," she said.
She suddenly realized the ashes of her deceased daughter, Vicki, were on the mantle in the living room.
"Oh my God," she said, breaking down in tears and collapsing back into the lawn chair behind her and into her sister's arms.
Fire crews were rotating tanker trucks to fill 4-inch water lines winding up the stone and dirt driveway in order to battle the fire.
The call was broadcast about 2 p.m. and the building was engulfed when crews arrived, said South Franklin fire Chief Jerry Hickman.
Fire crews were working to extinguish the fire from the outside of the building, working against the wind cutting across the hilltop and swirling the smoke into their faces as water hit the charred timbers that once framed the house.
"Everybody was accounted for and it was a total loss when we got here. So, I'm not going to send anyone in to get hurt," he said.
Other fire companies assisting at the scene included Lone Pine, Morris Township, Amwell Township, North Franklin Township and Canton Township volunteer fire departments.
