Second fire at house ruled arson

Mechanicsville structure was vacant

Friday, March 12, 2010

State investigators suspect that a fire Wednesday morning on the second floor of a vacant house in Mechanicsville was intentionally set, and they are revisiting their investigation of an earlier fire in the house.

The second fire in a week's time caused much more damage at the two-story wooden frame house on Three Notch Road owned by John Erskine, a local builder, according to Deputy Chief Fire Marshal Duane Svites.

"I think he was looking [to find] some renters or he was going to use it for part of his business," Svites said, but the second fire quadrupled the overall loss to $100,000. "It would take quite a bit," the investigator said, "to get it back in [habitable] condition."

On the afternoon of March 4, three dozen Mechanicsville, Hollywood, Hughesville, and Benedict volunteer firefighters responding to a 5:16 p.m. alarm battled the initial blaze at the house for 15 minutes to bring it under control. County officials report that the house's first floor began to collapse as firefighters were extinguishing the blaze, prompting an order that they evacuate that area. They eventually gained access to the home's attic.

Deputy fire marshals issued a notice of investigation stating that their preliminary findings listed that fire as accidental and that it was caused by an unattended kerosene heater in the living room.

"It's being revisited. The investigation is not over," Svites said this week.

Shortly before 9:30 a.m. Wednesday, a passing motorist discovered that the house again was on fire, the fire marshal's office reports, and 35 volunteer firefighters battled that blaze for half an hour to bring it under control.

Svites said the cause of the second fire has been determined.

"Someone intentionally set it upstairs," the investigator said, adding that no suspects have been developed.

"We're going to look a lot closer at what's going on there," he said. "The investigation is in its infancy stages."

Svites asked that anyone with information about the two fires call the fire marshal's regional office at 443-550-6833.

jwharton@somdnews.com