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Woman dies in house fire near Zephyrhills
By CHASE SQUIRES © St. Petersburg Times, published October 18, 2000 ZEPHYRHILLS -- An 80-year-old woman died Tuesday night, apparently the victim of a fire that ripped through her Palm Estates manufactured home as neighbors battled to rescue her. Zephyrhills fire crews arrived shortly after 7:15 p.m. to find the blaze nearly extinguished by neighbors using garden hoses. Fire Chief Robert Hartwig said rescue teams found the elderly woman in her bedroom, apparently dead from the smoke and flames. Authorities at the scene said they could not immediately confirm the woman's identity, but longtime neighbors identified her as Grace Stoller, 80. She lived at 4425 Autumn Palm Drive, just south of C Avenue and outside Zephyrhills. Neighbor Donny Alldredge said he heard the commotion and went outside to find several neighbors struggling to get inside Stoller's single-story, white and brown home. Alldredge said that while some poured water from garden hoses inside the house, he ripped the carport door open. He tried to get inside but was pushed back by smoke and flames. "It was like a furnace. I couldn't get inside," he said. "It seems like there should have been more we could have done, but we did all we could. It was so hot in there I couldn't even get in the door." As fire crews worked to clear Stoller's home of smoke, neighbors gathered around. "She was a sweet, sweet lady," neighbor Bill Strope said. "She was the kind of lady you would want for your neighbor." Hartwig said there was no indication that Stoller's death was anything but an accident, but an investigator from the state Fire Marshal's Office was summoned to the scene as a matter of course. - Staff writer Ryan Davis contributed to this report.
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