Both blazes at Ware Road mobile homes are caused by food left cooking on stoves.

Freeport’s fire chief says two fires his department fought on consecutive days, both in mobile homes next door to each other, were caused by food left cooking on stoves.

Fire Chief Darrel Fournier said firefighters were called to 3 Ware Road at 6:35 a.m. Monday and found heavy fire coming from the kitchen and living room.

The double-wide manufactured home is located next to the mobile home at 5 Ware Road that burned Sunday.

Family members escaped unharmed but two dogs died in Monday’s fire, which destroyed the home’s interior and caused about $115,000 in damage to the property and its contents, Fournier said.

The woman occupant and her two children awakened to the sound of smoke detectors and got out of the house.

The children’s father had left for work 20 minutes earlier, Fournier said.

The cause of both fires was accidental – food left cooking on a stove, Fournier said. The two homes are 400 to 500 feet apart, Fournier said.

The owner of the building at 3 Ware Road has insurance, but the tenants, the Argraves family, did not, according to friends.

The owners occupying 5 Ware Road – Lester Scott Jr. and his son, Lester Colby Scott III – had canceled their insurance a couple of months before Sunday’s fire, Fournier said.

The Red Cross has provided the occupants of that home – an elderly man whose wife died recently, and his adult son – with a place to stay while they seek more permanent accommodations.

Neighbors are organizing a benefit supper for the displaced families Feb. 1 at the Masonic Lodge on Mallett Drive and have set up a Facebook page at: www.facebook.com/WareRoadFires.

Staff Writer Dennis Hoey contributed to this report.

David Hench can be contacted at 791-6327 or at:

dhench@pressherald.com