GARDINER — A local family escaped unharmed Saturday night from a fire that sent flames shooting above surrounding trees and destroyed their barn and damaged their home.

No firefighters were hurt while extinguishing the blaze at 12 Deane St., and the Bustos family’s pet cat also survived.

Leanna Bustos said her husband, Tom, and 15-year-old son, Alex, were home watching videos about 7:30 p.m. when they heard a boom, followed by a series of pops coming from the small barn attached to the house the couple have lived in for about 18 years.

Tom Bustos saw the front entryway of the barn in flames. He grabbed a garden house to try to extinguish the fire, but it had little effect.

Bustos and his son, who got out of the house in only his underwear, moved vehicles away from the flames while neighbors called the Fire Department.

Tom Bustos called his wife, who works in home health care and was with a client in Winthrop. She rushed home, still thinking her son was inside the house.

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“I thought my son was in the house, so I was screaming for him, screaming and screaming for them to get my son,” Leanna Bustos said Sunday.

She tried to get into the home to find her son, but police told her that he was safe, up the street at a neighbor’s.

The family went to a hotel after the fire was extinguished around 1 a.m. Sunday. By 8 a.m., they were outside the home, awaiting a visit from the American Red Cross.

Leanna Bustos said they might take their small camper to a local campground and stay there.

“We do have insurance, thank God for that,” she said.

“I was worried it might have lapsed. We called last night, and it hadn’t.”

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The fire was so hot it melted kayaks stored several feet from the barn, and melted the grill in a pickup truck near the barn.

Tom Bustos said flames were shooting above the treetops that surround the home, appearing to reach up to 100 feet high.

All that is left of the barn is the charred outer shell.

The front part of the home appeared untouched by flames, but the rear portion near the barn, including the kitchen, sustained heavy fire damage.

Tom Bustos said he’s doubtful the home will be livable because of damage from fire, smoke and water.

The couple hoped to be able to enter the home Sunday to see if they could retrieve old photographs and see what else survived the fire.

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Leanne Bustos, holding back tears, said Sunday morning they weren’t sure what to do next.

Neither she nor her husband knew how the fire might have started.

Gardiner Fire Department Lt. Dustin Barry said the first firefighters on the scene, followed by a mutual aid crew from Farmingdale, helped prevent the fire from spreading into the rest of the house.

He said the Office of State Fire Marshal plans to send an investigator to the scene Monday to try to determine the fire’s cause.

Firefighters from Augusta, Togus, Pittston, Randolph, Farmingdale and West Gardiner responded to assist Gardiner firefighters at the blaze, which sent up a plume of black smoke visible throughout the area.

The home, according to city tax records, was built in 1890 and the home and half-acre property are valued at $90,300.

Keith Edwards can be contacted at 621-5647 or at:

kedwards@centralmaine.com;kedwards@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @kedwardskj;@kedwardskj


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