THE DAY - Monday, October 26, 1998
Posted here with permission of The Day.

Gales Ferry Fire

Teens escape fire that destroyed garage, bedroom of house in Ledyard

A post-fire investigation identified the cause as a 12-year- old boy who was trying to heat up a fuel line on a dirt bike with a lighter.

By Kelly J. Carter
Day Staff Writer

Ledyard - A fire destroyed a garage, a truck and part of a house at 22 Norman Drive Sunday afternoon.

The blaze started in the garage and swept to the back corner of the house while four teenagers were there alone. No one was hurt.

The teens - two daughters, a son and a friend, escaped the garage unharmed when the fire broke out. They were working on a motor bike in the garage, and gasoline in the bike started to burn, said Gales Ferry, Fire Chief Sean McGuckin.

A friend of the family, who didn't want to be identified, said he stopped by the house at about 1:50 p.m. to check on the children, because he know their mother was out on a bike.

As he arrived, he said, the kids ran out of the garage yelling that there was a fire.

"Thank God, I stopped by when I did he said.

The teens' visiting friend was trapped in the garage, he recalled. He tried the back door to the garage, but it was stuck. He ran around the front of the building and opened the garage door, and the youth crawled out.

The man said he could see the fire traveling along the floor, consuming a spilled liquid. "You could see it starting to catch," he said.

A Chevy Blazer parked near the garage in the driveway was gutted. The fire also destroyed walls in laundry room on the lower level of the house, and an upstairs bedroom.

The eaves of the roof were damaged. There was a little smoke damage inside the house

"The good news is no one Was hurt," said McGuckin.

Ledyard, Gales Ferry, Submarine Base, Center Groton and Poquetanuck fire departments, and Ledyard Ambulance, responded to the fire. The family could not stay at the house because the electricity was shut off, said McGuckin. The Red Cross was called to assist the family.

Fire officials didn't have the name of the family. The fire is under investigation by Ledyard Fire Marshall Don Casvante and the state fire marshal.