A fire Wednesday afternoon in Tarentum left a woman homeless and forced a business to close.

The fire started just before 1 p.m. at a building at Second Avenue and Ross Street that houses Allegheny Angler and a woman’s home.

The bait-and-tackle shop occupies part of the L-shaped building and the other part has a residence on the second floor with a two-bay garage beneath it.

Rich Heuser, Eureka Fire Rescue EMS operations manager, said the fire remains under investigation by the Allegheny County Fire Marshal, but appears to have started in the kitchen area of the house. No one was home at the time.

The fire appears to be accidental, according to Heuser.

Heuser said the fire was knocked down in about 25 minutes.

The building is owned by Olivia Phillips, who lived in the house portion of the building and rented the commercial part to Rick DeMichele. He runs Allegheny Angler, a bait-and-tackle shop that’s been open for 30 years.

Phillips’ ex-husband, John Phillips, said at least one of her two cats died in the fire.

Heuser said Olivia Phillips is staying with family and there was no need to involve the Red Cross.

DeMichele said he was working when someone came in and told him they saw smoke coming from the upstairs. He called 911 and then smoke started filling the business.

“It happened so fast,” he said.

DeMichele and his employees were carrying out what they could salvage after the fire was knocked out. He feared his shop would have smoke and water damage.

Mike Walsh, waterways conservation officer and state Fish and Boat Commission, said Allegheny Angler is one of only three bait-and-tackle shops in the area. The other two are in Harmar and Kittanning.

“It’s getting harder and harder to find them,” Walsh said. “A lot of it’s being replaced by the ‘big box’ stores.”

Walsh said the local bait-and-tackle shops provide more specialized services and are often located close to waterways to make it easy for local fishermen. Allegheny Angler is two blocks from the Allegheny River.

“These are all services that are going to be a loss to the community while they’re waiting to either rebuild or get everybody back into some order,” he said.

Walsh said while fishing season is slowing down, some fishermen are gearing up for steelhead trout fishing on Lake Erie and ice fishing this winter.

“There’s always something you can go and catch at any time of the year,” he said.

No other information was immediately available Wednesday afternoon.

Emily Balser is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Emily at 724-226-4680, emilybalser@tribweb.com or via Twitter @emilybalser.

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