At least two dead in ‘suspicious’ house explosion

Firefighters gather around the edges of the home at 29235 Ketterhagen Road Sunday after a fire and explosion leveled it Saturday. (Photo by Jennifer Eisenbart)
Firefighters gather around the edges of the home at 29235 Ketterhagen Road Sunday after a fire and explosion leveled it Saturday. (Photo by Jennifer Eisenbart)

By Jennifer Eisenbart
Staff Writer

Racine County Sheriff’s officials on Tuesday continued to sift through the rubble of a rural Burlington home in hopes of finding the body of a suspected third victim in Saturday’s fire and explosion.

“As you can imagine, there’s a lot of debris that we are sifting through,” Sheriff Christopher Schmaling wrote in a text message to the Standard Press. “(We) are committed to doing nothing short of a thorough job.”

Schmaling confirmed Sunday night that there are at lease two fatalities following the explosion that leveled the home at 29235 Ketterhagen Road. The bodies of both victims were discovered in the charred remains of the home.

Family members of Craig Lambert and Kim Howe – the husband and wife who lived in the house – said they believe both were home, along with Kim’s son, Nicholas, when the fire broke out.

Schmaling confirmed the sheriff’s department believes, based on the family’s statements, that all three were home when the fire started – and when the home exploded. He also said the fire is suspicious in nature.

Schmaling offered his condolences to the family Tuesday afternoon.

“Our thoughts and prayers go out to the victims of this very unfortunate incident,” Schmaling wrote.

Kayla Lambert, Craig’s daughter, and Tamara Burgos, Howe’s daughter, both said Sunday the family’s two vehicles were at the home when the fire occurred, and that Nicholas would have been with Howe.

“There’s no way,” Kayla Lambert said that the two would have been separated.

Burgos, who said Sunday her mother and stepfather had argued the night before, had been waiting for a phone call from Howe to meet her for lunch or dinner.

Her mother never called and Burgos put out a heartbreaking plea on Facebook Saturday afternoon after seeing the news about the explosion.

“I know the first one is my stepfather and I believe the second one is my mother,” Burgos said of the two bodies that had been recovered.

The third body had yet to be recovered as of Tuesday, but Burgos said a family dog had been found dead in the home.

The call regarding the fire came in about 3:15 p.m. Saturday afternoon. Schmaling said that, minutes later, the house exploded.

Town and city of Burlington firefighters initially responded, but several different levels of the Mutual Aid Box Alarm System were quickly activated. Town Fire Chief Ed Umnus said that, initially, they went to five levels of the box system for tenders (water trucks) but later ended up filling in the second and third alarms completely due to needed personnel, equipment and trucks.

The Racine County Fire Investigation Task Force was on the scene Saturday when the fire was finally put out, and additional sheriffs department staff were on scene Sunday.

At one point, SWAT team members fanned out with their rifles in hand, which Schmaling said was a precautionary measure due to the nature of the investigation.

He said they and members of the various departments who were on utility vehicles were searching the area for evidence.

The level of destruction, however, appeared to be making that investigation difficult. Schmaling and Umnus both said they’d never seen anything like this before.

“It’s a struggle, because there’s literally nothing left to investigate,” Umnus said.


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