Two fires broke out at a Jefferson mobile home Monday, one in the early afternoon, the other at night.
Firefighters were able to limit the damage from the first blaze, which started in the bathroom of the double-wide, but the home was destroyed by the second.
“It was a total loss,” Jefferson Fire Chief Walter Morris said Tuesday. “A passer-by reported seeing flames. They were shooting out of the roof when we arrived.”
The owners of the home, Enos Webster Jr. and Julie Webster, and their teenage son, Cody, were not home during the second fire, Morris said, and no one was injured in either blaze.
A half dozen area fire departments responded after the second fire was reported around 9:30 p.m., and firefighters remained at the scene until 2:30 a.m.
State fire marshal’s investigators office were at the fire scene Tuesday, said Sgt. Ken Grimes of the Office of the Maine State Fire Marshal, but they have not determined the cause of either fire.
“The fire is going to be listed as ‘undetermined,'” Grimes said. “A second fire destroyed the information that we would need to classify the first fire.”
The second fire was “possibly a rekindle,” Grimes said, meaning that embers from the first may have flared back up. “But we’re still trying to figure that out.”
Enos Webster Jr. didn’t respond immediately to a voicemail message left on his phone Tuesday afternoon.
He was at the scene of the first fire Monday and said it might have been caused by an unattended cigarette. The home was insured, and an investigator for the insurance company was also there Tuesday, according to Morris.
The Websters are now staying in a school bus that they have converted into a recreational vehicle, Enos Webster Jr. said Monday.
Charles Eichacker — 621-5642
Twitter: @ceichacker
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