Overview
- A fire began in a first-floor storage room of the centuries-old parish house after a battery-powered handheld vacuum caught fire while charging.
- Heavy smoke prompted the priest and staff to raise the alarm and two people—the cleaning worker and the priest—were taken to hospital while two other employees were treated on site for smoke inhalation.
- Volunteer brigades from Wemding and Amerbach mobilized dozens of firefighters to extinguish the flames and to cut open the ceiling to search for smoldering spots.
- Inspectors found the main wooden beams and the earthen floor of the affected ceiling intact but declared the entire first upper floor uninhabitable and estimated material damage in the high four-figure range.
- Police have opened formal investigations into the precise technical cause of the battery failure and the incident puts a spotlight on fire risks from charging lithium-battery devices in old, tightly built historic homes.