Malfunctioning Fan Causes Oak Drive House Fire

By Andrew Gorosko

Several volunteer firefighters were at the Sandy Hook Volunteer Fire and Rescue Company’s firehouse on Riverside Road about 2:54 pm Friday, April 11, when a call for help was placed from a home on Oak Drive.

Responding to a report of a house fire at 3 Oak Drive, those firefighters quickly entered fire trucks and drove the one-mile distance to the single-story home where they found that a malfunctioning ventilation fan in a bathroom had caught fire, creating heavy smoke in the Szalay residence, according to Sandy Hook Fire Chief Bill Halstead.

Newtown Hook & Ladder, Hawleyville, and Dodgingtown firefighters also were alerted of the fire, but their fire trucks did not proceed to the Oak Drive scene, where Sandy Hook staffers rapidly extinguished the blaze.

Chief Halstead said that the fire started in a trouble-prone ceiling-mounted ventilation fan in a bathroom. The fan’s power switch had inadvertently been left in the “on” position, and the fan’s motor caught fire, he said.

The fan’s housing then melted and fell, igniting a nearby plastic shower curtain whose flames produced heavy black smoke, the fire chief said. The burning shower curtain produced an acrid odor that could be smelled near the home.

Lorna Szalay and her two sons were at home when the fire occurred, Chief Halstead said. There were no injuries in the blaze, he added.

The fire damaged the bathroom ceiling and the house’s attic, and caused general smoke damage to the residence, he said. The bathroom was blackened by the incident. The fire chief, who also is the town fire marshal, estimated repair costs at $17,000.

Firefighters put out the blaze using handheld pressurized-water fire extinguishers, Chief Halstead said. Using those devices minimizes water damage in such incidents.

Seventeen Sandy Hook firefighters responded to the scene. Four Sandy Hook fire trucks went to the incident, including the Quint truck, whose onboard ladder was extended to the house’s roof.

Firefighters stayed at the scene until after 4 pm, cleaning up the site and exhausting the smoke that had entered the house’s attic, said Chief Halstead. The majority of damage caused by the fire was smoke damage, he said.

Chief Halstead said this week that repairs were being made to fix the damage caused by the accidental fire. The property is insured for such damage, he said.