Cause Undetermined—

Sandy Hook House Fire Ruled Accidental

By Andrew Gorosko

Both the town fire marshal’s office and an insurance firm have concluded their investigations into the cause of a February 2 fire that extensively damaged a ranch-style house at 10 Deerfield Drive in Sandy Hook, ruling that the blaze was accidental.

Deputy Fire Marshal Rich Frampton said February 9 that he has conferred with an insurance investigator for the firm that insures the residence and they concur that the blaze that caused more than $250,000 of damage to the premises was an accidental fire of undetermined origin which is not suspicious.

The insurance firm has agreed to pay out a claim to resident Akos “Tony” Rathonyi, Mr Frampton said.

Mr Rathonyi is living elsewhere because the town has condemned the house. The house is not habitable due to its extensive damage. The options for the structure are either to repair it or to raze it, depending upon which is deemed the more financially practical choice.

Mr Frampton said that fire-resistant sheetrock panels that were in place inside the house limited the amount of structural damage that occurred there during the fire.

Mr Frampton said that after determining that the fire was not suspicious, but accidental, the insurance firm decided against further study to determine the specific cause of the blaze.

The fire’s point of origin was in the general area of a woodstove inside a finished basement, which is adjacent to a two-bay garage in the lower level of the ranch house. Before he had left the premises for the day, Mr Rathonyi had loaded some wood into the woodstove to fuel it to heat the house, according to Mr Frampton.

The fire initially was confined to the basement area, but then flashed up into the house’s upper level. The structure’s interior was quite cluttered with various items as firefighters attacked the blaze.

At 2:48 pm on February 2, firefighters received a report that the Deerfield Drive house was ablaze. Firefighters from all five local volunteer companies, as well as Southbury, responded to the scene. About 90 firefighters went to the blaze.

To fight the blaze, firefighters set up a tanker shuttle that transported water to the fire from a pond off Old Mill Road, which lies about 6,000 feet from the fire scene. Firefighters used about 30,000 gallons of water to extinguish the blaze.