He said his thoughts went immediately to the safety of the residents.

“I didn’t react to the house being on fire,” he told the Standard-Examiner. “I reacted to making sure that everybody is safe. That was my first thought: Is everybody out of the house? First and only thought.”

Fortunately, nobody was home at the time.

“The house can be replaced, or it can be knocked down, but you can’t replace a human,” he said. “So I’m just glad … no one was home at the time.”

Layton City Fire Chief Scott Maughan said a call came in at 2:57 p.m. about the fire, located at 2132 East 3450 North.

“Obviously, the house is almost a total loss, unfortunately,” Maughan said

Maughan said four people lived in the house and there were no injuries as of yet. He said the cause is still to be determined and will be under investigation.

He said Layton City Fire was assisted by crews from Kaysville, Syracuse and Clinton. He said it was almost a two-alarm fire “because of the heat and the accessibility, trying to get back behind the home and just how hot it was.”

According to Maughan, crews spent “two hours and some change” trying to get the fire out.

One of the residents said “neighbors heard explosions,” but he didn’t know the cause.

“There’s nothing, you know, left of the upstairs,” he said.

Contact Standard-Examiner editor Ryan Comer at rcomer@standard.net.