Westport fire was malicious

QUENCHED Fire fighters completing their work at the scene of the fire at the Quay in Westport last week.

Gardaí: Westport fire was malicious

Neill O’Neill

Gardaí investigating the cause of a fire which damaged three houses in Cloonmonad Close in Westport on Friday afternoon last do not believe it started accidentally.
Two units from Westport Fire Station were called to the scene of the incident just off the Quay Road around 3pm, when neighbours of an unoccupied residence in the estate saw a tower of flames, higher than the houses in the area, spewing out of a garden shed at the rear of the property.
When they arrived the fire personnel discovered that two domestic oil tanks, in separate gardens adjacent to the shed, had caught fire, fuelling the inferno and transforming a routine extinction into a dangerous operation. The gardens of both semi-detatched houses were also destroyed, along with boundary fences, trees and two sheds.
Such was the heat of the blaze that the rear windows and doors of both houses were destroyed while the down-pipes and outdoor light fittings were melted off the walls. A third house nearby had its rear windows cracked.
Speaking to The Mayo News at the scene, Station Officer in Westport, Noel Duffy, said that it was lucky the damage was only material.
“It is a bright sunny evening and school is finished for the weekend so there are a lot of children playing around here. This area is densely populated and it’s just lucky that the children weren’t too close when those tanks took light. Our water was just agitating the fuel so we had to foam the blaze down in order to contain it. It could have been a very dangerous situation.”
Niamh McLoughlin, who lives a few doors down from the scene, said she heard the commotion and went to see what was going on. “I could hear children shouting and when I came outside I saw the flames coming over the roof of the house. I wasn’t sure what was going on but knew it was very dangerous. My neighbour’s daughter came running into the house screaming about a fire so she called the fire brigade and we just tried to keep everyone a safe distance back until they arrived.”