Workwise, the van was all Mark McAfee had.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” McAfee said after his 1989 Toyota minivan caught fire and blew up Monday. “I haven’t been able to think straight.”

Around 10 a.m. Monday, McAfee pulled into the parking lot of First Christian Church, 1000 Ky., where was planning on working as a handyman. The church, closed for the Easter holiday, stood vacant.

“When I pulled into the lot, I started smelling gas,” he said.

He tugged on the locked door, then walked back to the van – a van he used for work, to haul his bike, to store a futon mattress he kept in the back.

Smoke billowed from under the van.

“The whole engine was on fire,” he said. “It happened so fast.”

The engine blew. Flames spread from under the driver’s seat, where the engine sits, to the rest of the car. In an instant, it seemed the whole van was on fire.

McAfee noticed melted fuel lines and suspected a gas fire. When electrical wires melted together, the engine began cranking on its own, pumping more burning fuel through the engine.

By the time police and fire crews arrived, the futon mattress became fuel for the blaze. McAfee said the fire took some time to put out, and by the time firefighters extinguished the last smoldering bit of mattress, the van was a loss.

Now McAfee is stuck at his house far out in East Lawrence. Always looking for work, he fears his income will dry up without transportation.

His insurance won’t cover it, and though his tools made it out of the blaze in good shape, they’ll sit until he finds another way around.

“Right now, I just feel lost,” he said.