BY TIM BEIMAL
Clintonville Tribune-Gazette Editor
(Permission was received to reprint)
CLINTONVILLE — A fish farm owned by Patrick and Kari Kloehn of rural Clintonville went up in flames on the evening of Sunday, Nov. 23 and early morning hours of Monday, Nov. 24.
The Clintonville Fire Department responded to the blaze at around 11 p.m. on Sunday after Kari saw flames coming from one of the sheds connected to the fish farm operation.
“Kari came in the house and told me the shed was on fire, and she called 911 right away,” said Patrick. “I ran outside with a fire extinguisher but I realized pretty quickly that it wasn’t worth risking my life to fight the blaze.”
Fire departments from Bear Creek and Navarino responded to the fire and Clintonville Fire Chief Dean Poole declared the site a total loss before 2 a.m. The blaze continued, and Clintonville firefighters remained at the scene until around 9 a.m. Monday morning. A 50-foot by 150-foot shed was connected to a barn and processing room along with a separate room where the fish were being raised. Each of these structures was engulfed and burned to the ground.
The farm, licensed by the state of Wisconsin, had been a project for Patrick and Kari for a number of years, as they resurrected the former site of Gemma Aquaculture. The Kloehns had named their operation “Catch of the Day” and had just received their first batch of perch in September after many delays and obstacles.
“All I could think about when I was watching it burn was every nail I put in, every pipe-fitting we installed,” Patrick said. “There are countless hours of work that went into it, and in just one night, it was all gone.” Hundreds of water samples were conducted and many tanks were purchased, cleaned and moved into place, all connected by a complex network of PVC pipe and water pumps, to create the fish farm.
Several oxygen bottles were also damaged or destroyed in the fire. A large liquid oxygen tank was nowhere to be found. It is assumed that the tank exploded and literally flew off the property.
The cause of the fire is not yet known, although a wood burner was located in the shed to help keep the temperature up in the room where the fish were housed. Patrick noted that there was also a significant amount of electrical power being used to pump and circulate the water.
The Kloehns and their two young sons, Payton and Eli, left their home and went to a neighbors house later in the evening. Poole said that the house was “minutes from going up” due to the intense heat radiating from the blaze nearly 30 yards from the home. Siding on the house was melted and steam billowed from the roof as firefighters doused the house to keep it from catching fire.
An excavator was also called in during the early morning hours on Monday to help the firemen get to the blaze in the all-steel shed. Once on site, the heavy machinery was used to do some debris clearing as well.
Patrick said a plethora of items housed in the buildings were lost in the fire as well. A truck, two cars, hand tools, cordless drills and countless other items were destroyed. On Saturday, Nov. 29, friends and family came out to help him sort through the rubble and take out anything that was still good.
“I walked through the entire place writing down what had been in each spot, as best I could remember,” Patrick said. “We wound up with six pages, two columns per page, of items that we could think of as we walked through the buildings.”
Now, the landscape behind their home will be removed of every building that had once stood there, except the house. Another pole shed had collapsed under heavy snow in February.
Patrick said they are not sure if they will try to rebuild the fish farm or not. Right now, they are exploring options and have not ruled anything out at this point.
Despite the tragedy, the Kloehns remain positive and have cited their faith in God as the stabilizing factor in this situation.
“Romans 8:28 says, “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose,” quoted Patrick. “We believe this. This Thanksgiving we are so thankful for our family, friends, and the Truth of God.
“I was thinking about it, and was thinking that we are back to where we started five years ago when we moved out here,” Patrick said. “But then I talked about it with Kari and we realized that all of the buildings — it’s just ’stuff’. We now have two wonderful kids and another one on the way. We have a nice house to live in. We are so much better off now than we were five years ago. God will work it out. When we started this operation, we committed it all to God, so it’s all in His hands. We trust Him.”
