After six months, the state fire marshall’s office has released a heavily redacted report of its investigation into the October fire that burned down commercial businesses and apartments in the Quick Shop complex.
The fire started on Oct. 5 and emergency dispatchers were called just before 9:30 p.m. Haines fire chief Brian Clay said the fire was burning unusually fast. He said a firefighter had driven by the store less than 15 minutes before the fire started and had not seen any sign of it. When firefighters pulled on scene, Clay said the bottom floor of the building looked like it was open for business.
“There was no smoke, there were no flames, there was nothing on the first floor,” he said.
“It’s not a smoldering fire. It’s either been going on for a while or it had some help is what we were thinking.”
That’s partly why local emergency responders asked the state Department of Public Safety to investigate. According to the report, provided by public records request to the Chilkat Valley News, a deputy fire marshall from Fairbanks was called in to do an origin and cause investigation due to the large commercial loss and the “high likelihood of an intentional fire.”
Another reason local firefighters wanted to rule out arson, Clay said, was to address a number of local rumors, including that police got a report that a man was running around the scene with two water cans in his hands. The implication was that he had used some type of accelerant.
“When we checked them in the vehicle they had water in them. They weren’t empty. They didn’t smell like they had petrol or accelerants or anything like that,” Clay said.
Ultimately, the investigator didn’t find any evidence of arson according to the report. That means that the exact cause of the fire has been listed as “undetermined.”
Clay blamed this outcome, in part, on the fire itself.
“Most of the time, not all the time, they can figure out burn patterns, witness stories, what the firefighters witnessed when they were on scene, those kinds of things,” he said. “This one here, where they had the total collapse of the building, it covers up a lot of things.”
The investigator, a Fairbanks-area deputy fire marshall named Paul Carrington, arrived in Haines a few days after the fire. For his report, he interviewed building owner Mike Ward, Chief Clay, police officer Michael Fullerton, and two witnesses.
Large portions of those interviews were redacted, with the justification of a state statute that exempts the information from being released if it could be considered an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy. The Chilkat Valley News has appealed those redactions.
Based on that investigation, the fire marshall determined that the origin of the fire was in a rear bedroom of one of the destroyed apartments.
“The exact cause had not been identified, however at this time criminal activity is not suspected,” Carrington wrote.
He estimated that the structure and its contents at a $3.5 million loss.
“I would love to know what started it. That’s the big one,” Clay said. “Luckily everybody’s safe, nobody got hurt. It’s just a building.