The Troy Volunteer Fire Department fought a house fire early Tuesday morning on Riverside Avenue in Troy.

Fire Chief D.J. Welch said putting out the fire was a struggle. “It was a very tough fire” with lots of false ceilings up in the roof.

There was a lot of smoke coming up through the eaves of the house with some smoke in the kitchen, he said. It got up into the roof and all the false roofs.

Lots of water and manpower was used to put the fire out. Which was “about all we could do on this one,” he said. Firefighters had to saw into the house to get into different layers of the roof.

Crews cut holes on two different spots on the house near the roof in an attempt to fully put out the fire and douse it with water.

Firefighter’s response time to the fire in Troy was pretty quick, he said. It took about four-to-five minutes for firefighters to arrive.

But, with many firefighters out of town for work when the dispatch went out around 7:30 a.m., the department had to sound the siren twice, and department retirees had to come out to help put the fire out.

The retires came out and helped extinguish the fire along with the department’s former chief, Larry Chapel, Welch said. “A couple guys that weren’t even on the department gave us a hand.”

Aside from the false ceilings, fire crews also had to deal with the house’s older construction. “It’s an old, old building” with “real dry” wood.

The house was built around the turn of the century, he said.

Homeowner Waller Ballard said he did not think much of a smokey smell when he got out of the shower in the morning.

“I just got out of the shower and I smelled smoke,” he said. But when he went downstairs it was all “black and smokey.”

Ballard said he then grabbed his dog and ran out the door.

While looking at Troy fire crews extinguishing the rest of the fire, Ballard said he was feeling “all knocked up [and] kinda shaky.”

Troy Fire Marshal Gene Rogers said the cause of the fire is still under investigation