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No injuries follow smoky middle school dishwasher fire

By Brian Hagen

08/25/2025

(KAIR)--A "minor fire that produced a lot of smoke" served as "a great exercise for the [Atchison Middle school which] reacted very quickly and safely getting students out of the building."

Those are the words of Atchison Fire Chief Patrick Weishaar following the fire department's late Monday morning response to the school, located at 301 North 5th Street, where "a dish washing machine had malfunctioned and operating equipment inside the unit had caught fire, creating a significant amount of smoke" originating in the dishwashing area of the school's kitchen.

Arriving at the school around 11:15 Monday morning, Weishaar, in a release issued Monday afternoon, says the responder's "found that students and staff were completing a safe, successful evacuation."

Saying that once the fire was quickly extinguished and the source of the smoke eliminated, Weishaar explains that by "using powerful, electric and battery powered fans," the firefighters "were able to ventilate the building, and reset the alarm system, allowing students and staff back inside," after smoke had filled the kitchen and adjacent offices, while lightly filling the cafeteria seating area.

Weishaar, in the release, credits the Atchison Middle School's fire safety system, which he says "worked perfectly" in containing the smoke and keeping students and staff safe, with no injuries reported.