SCARBOROUGH — The Maine State Fire Marshal’s Office has determined that a fire that destroyed much of Scarborough Commons on Route 1 was caused by an accidental electrical malfunction.
Investigators with the fire marshal’s office, along with Scarborough firefighters and agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives determined the fire started in the offices of Chapman Chiropractic Center in the back of the building and was not suspicious, said State Fire Marshal Joseph Thomas.
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Parts, but not all, of the commercial building have sprinklers.
“There have been five different construction add-ons for that building,” Thomas said. “The most recent add-ons would be under the most recent codes and have sprinklers.” Sprinklers may not have been required when the older sections were built, he said.
There is a limit to what sprinklers can extinguish, Thomas said. They are designed to put out a fire as it gets started, with one to four sprinkler heads discharging. If the fire spreads and triggers additional sprinkler heads, they will have diminished flow of water because the system has a limited water flow. Also, if fire spreads to the space above the sprinklers, such as an attic crawl space, the fire can build and spread quickly without the sprinklers having any effect.
Investigators disclosed the cause of the fire at a news conference Tuesday afternoon at the site of the fire.
Tuesday monring, tenants gathered in front of the building and surveyed the damage from the massive fire that gutted much of the building.
Andy Tabor, owner of Focused on You, a digital imaging and computer repair service, said he was able to retrieve some of his customers’ equipment and data.
“There is hundreds of thousands of dollars of equipment in there,” said Tabor as he stared at the facade of his business. “We haven’t been able to see what’s going on.
“The fire department did a pretty good job containing it. I just don’t know how much damage there is,” Tabor said.
Karen Vincent, who works for Maine Society of CPAs, which was in a third-floor office visible through broken, blackened windows, described her emotional state as one of shock and disbelief.
“It’s surreal. I was just there yesterday,” Vincent said.
Penny Kacere, who works at Scarborough Legal Center, showed up Tuesday with a pair of binoculars, trying to peer in through an open door to assess the damage to the office. Computer files are backed up on off-site servers but there are paper files, she said. The office has two large fireproof safes where it keeps wills and similar documents, she said.
“It’s just going to be sad if they end up tearing it down,” said Kacere, who has worked in the complex since 1989.
Jim Hustus of Sullivan and Merritt Constructors leaned against the hood of his pickup and handled a succession of telephone calls as he tried to get his construction management business working again. The company has three other offices in the state so employees were relocating there and hoped to settle in by Wednesday.
However, he expects most of the company’s office equipment was damaged and will need to be replaced. The office is insured, he said.
“Computers, office supplies, all that stuff is gone,” he said. “We’ve started looking for a new facility. … We should be able to get on our feet again real quick,” he said.
Scarborough Fire Chef Michael Thurlow said firefighters were called to the back of the building for a report of smoke and were quickly confronted with a fast-moving fire.
“We had a fire that was rapidly building,” he said. “We pulled the crews out so nobody got hurt.”
Firefighters took a defensive approach, Thurlow said, dousing the exterior with large amounts of water from multiple aerial ladders.
He said fighting the blaze was difficult in part because the building had been added onto many times creating different roof lines and voids between sections of the building that were difficult to access.
Twenty of the 24 units in the wood-frame building were rented, the chief said.
Thurlow said there are two crews of investigators working to determine the cause of the fire. One is interviewing tenants. The other is examining physical evidence. Scarborough investigators are working with the state Fire Marshal’s Office and will probably be on the scene most of the day, Thurlow said.
Three firefighters who were treated for heat exhaustion have been released from the hospital and are doing fine, he said.
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