SHELL KNOB — A mobile home fire in rural southwestern Missouri killed two adults and three children.
Authorities in Stone County said the victims were already dead when firefighters arrived at the scene in Shell Knob around 4:30 a.m. Saturday.
By Saturday night, the victims had been identified only as a 20-year-old woman; her three children, ages 3 years, 2 years and 7 or 8 months; and a 22-year-old man from Cassville who was a friend of the mother.
A state fire marshal's investigator said damage was so extensive that the cause of the blaze might never be known.
Shell Knob is located in the Mark Twain National Forest, about 40 miles south of Springfield.