A house fire displaced nine people Wednesday afternoon, ripping through a home on Old Cathedral Road.
“It went up like lightning,” said resident Shaun Dorrington, one of two family members home when the fire started. The house is owned by his mother-in-law, Cheryl Preston.
The house is split into a main home and an in-law apartment. Dorrington said he was alerted to the fire by his sister-in-law.
“She yelled ‘fire,’ and I got on and called 911,” he said. “When we went out, there was fire everywhere.”
Dorrington said the fire spread quickly.
“You could feel the heat,” he said. “It started in the back and just went that way and chafed the whole attic. It took that whole attic space, that’s how fast it can move.”
Dorrington said he attempted to fight the fire with a garden hose but said it did little good. His sister-in-law was taken to the hospital for smoke inhalation; Dorrington said she was doing well by the time crews cleared the scene.
Later that evening, Dorrington was also taken to Parkland Trauma in Derry by family members for treatment of smoke inhalation and carbon monoxide poisoning.
Rindge Fire Chief Bob Faas said the fire started at the back exterior of the house, broke through to the interior and spread to the roof. Faas was first to arrive on the scene and said he immediately observed heavy smoke coming from the back of the house.
Faas was able to speak with the occupants of the home, who had extricated themselves and were already outside, who confirmed there were no additional occupants inside, other than three cats.
Crews quickly knocked down a high volume of fire on the exterior of the house before entering the house to make an interior attack on the first floor. A second alarm was requested at 2:05, about 15 minutes after the first alert, to bring additional resources and manpower to the scene. Jaffrey and Winchendon fire crews arrived to help advance additional water lines manned by firefighters into the first and second floors of the residence to extinguish additional fire.
Ashby crews helped to establish a water supply for tankers at Grassy Pond.
After extinguishing the fire, the house was ventilated, and firefighters were able to remove the three cats and return them to their owners.
Faas said no firefighters were injured while combating the blaze.
More than half of the home is considered a total loss, and the remaining areas sustained significant smoke and water damage.
The American Red Cross was contacted to assist the family with immediate housing needs. Dorrington said the family will likely rely on a hotel while looking at rebuilding.
“It’s a tough road ahead,” he said.
Faas said the cause of the fire remains under investigation, but it is not considered suspicious in nature.
Rindge Fire Department was assisted on scene by the Rindge Police Department, the Jaffrey-Rindge Memorial Ambulance, and fire and rescue crews from Jaffrey, Winchendon, Mass., Fitzwilliam, Troy, Ashby, Mass., Richmond, Ashburnham, Mass., Peterborough, New Ipswich, Keene and Dublin. Templeton, Mass. covered the Rindge Fire Station during the incident.
The family is accepting egift cards for Market Basket, Walmart or Amazon to help fill their immediate needs. Egift cards can be sent to the family via Dorrington at shaunaimeed@gmail.com.