‘It’s like a bombshell’: Cigarette causes substantial damage to house in Fritz Cove area

A Fritz Cove Road residence was badly damaged by a fire early Tuesday morning after a cigarette from a discarded ashtray in a garbage bin ignited and spread to the structure.

Two people made it out of the home in the Fritz Cove area near Fox Farm Trail unharmed, according to the Capital City Fire/ Rescue Chief Rich Etheridge.

“The ash still had active embers in it and began to smoke inside of the waste can. The owner removed the waste can to the first-floor front entrance where it was able to ignite the waste can and travel vertically to the wooden siding and continue to travel to the second-floor roof eave which is where it extended into the attic space,” an information release about the fire stated.

According to Etheridge, CCFR received a call at around 2:31 a.m. that a fire had started on the back deck of the residence on the side of the building, which then caught fire in the attic area. He said the crew had difficulty extinguishing because of the tongue and groove ceiling which is not typical in the Juneau area.

Etheridge said CCFR officials remained at the scene until around 6:45 a.m. and were able to successfully put out all hot spots, and are now investigating the source of the fire.

“The fire is determined to be unintentional in nature due to discarded smoking materials,” the release stated.

Justin Cox, a Juneau resident and renter of the house, was the person who made the initial call to CCFR to notify them of the fire.

“I woke up and could see the light from the flames through the bathroom into my bedroom,” he told the Empire outside of the house Tuesday morning.

Wet cardboard boxes of clothes and belongings were scattered in the yard nearby the blacked house that no longer had much of its roof. Cox said since CCFR left early Tuesday morning, he had been collecting whatever belongings of his weren’t destroyed by the fire.

“I’m just getting what’s salvageable out of there,” he said.

Cox said at around 2 a.m. he had woken up to brightness, which he then realized was the flames of the fire. Cox said as soon as he was aware of what was happening he ´tried to figure out where his roommate was — who owns the house — who he said was on the deck at the time.

“It was a full-on fire by then,” he said.

After calling the police, Cox said he grabbed a ladder out, and was able to assist his roommate in getting down to the ground and away from the fire without injuries to either of them. He said he and his roommate were the only people living at the house at the time, and there were no pets in the building.

Cox, who is a carpenter, had been renting out the basement area since December after assisting with remodeling the house during the past year. He said beyond the damages from the flames, such as his shower and plumbing melting, “everything downstairs is soaking wet” from the rain and extinguishing effort. He did not have renters insurance, but said the owner did have homeowners insurance.

“I mean upstairs is toast, it looks like a bombshell up there,” he said. “It looked like 95% of the roof was gone.”

Cox said he will be living with his girlfriend while he figures out the next steps.

• Contact reporter Clarise Larson at clarise.larson@juneauempire.com or (651)-528-1807.