OWENSVILLE — Cause of an early-morning fire on Kuhne Road which claimed the life of an 81-year-old man is “undetermined,” according to Owensville Fire Chief Jeff Arnold.

Owensville volunteer firemen received the call to respond to the 3000 block of Kuhne Road at 6:30 a.m. Feb. 18 and upon arrival found the two-story wood-frame house “on the ground” already, according to Arnold. A neighbor who drove by the residence near the intersection of Kuhne and Buchholz Hollow Road at 5:30 a.m. did not see signs of fire. Another neighbor drove past an hour later and reported the blaze.

Arnold said the body of the home’s owner, Lloyd A. Schalk, was discovered in a partial basement underneath the front room. Firemen recovered his badly charred remains around 10:10 a.m. and Arnold said it appears he was attempting to exit through the front door when the floor collapsed underneath him.

Neighbors and family said Schalk heated his home with a wood-burning stove located on the main floor.

“Wood was his primary source of heat,” said Arnold.

Schalk’s body was transported to the Crawford County morgue in Cuba where an autopsy is planned for Friday.

Cause of the fire was being listed as “undetermined,” said Arnold, since there “wasn’t enough left of the house to know for sure what caused the fire.”

Volunteers from the Gerald-Rosebud Fire Protection District responded to the call for manpower and to assist in the search for the elderly victim. The man’s dog was outside when firemen arrived.