PLYMOUTH – For many small towns in Chenango County, one structure fire a year is just about the norm. Plymouth has had a half-dozen. Is it a string of coincidences or arson?
While at first officials said there was no cause for alarm, the Chenango County Sheriff’s Office has now opened an investigation into at least one suspicious fire in the Town of Plymouth.
The investigation is in relation to a small fire that started in a home in Plymouth Monday night. Within the last week, there have been two structure losses as a result of fires on the Rt. 21 in the hamlet.
Before Monday night’s criminal investigation began, fire investigators had reaffirmed in both newspaper and television interviews that there was no cause for alarm and refuted the notion of an arsonist being on the loose in the town.
Now, sources from both the Plymouth Fire Department and County Fire Coordinator Matt Beckwith say they could no longer comment on these events because of the ongoing police investigation.
“Every fire is treated as a suspicious fire until found to be otherwise,” said Beckwith.
Plymouth Fire Chief Matt Bates told local media sources Monday that, “there’s a lot of rumors going around town that we have an arsonist on the loose. None of these fires were the result of arson.”
It’s easy to see why residents in the hamlet of Plymouth along Rt. 21 are a bit uneasy these days – three recent fires have left blackened, burned-out buildings within a stone’s throw of each other.
While the Plymouth volunteer firefighters have been called out on about six fires this year, Bates said the last three in particular have caused concern for local residents.
On July 11, the spontaneous combustion of treated lumber in the garage of Matt Murphy destroyed that structure, but Bates said Plymouth firefighters were able to save the home.
Last Thursday around 11 p.m., Bates said a 200-year-old barn belonging to Rick and Ellen Adams caught fire, leveling the barn and damaging portions of the Adams home. That fire was ruled to be electrical in nature.
Not even two full days later, early Saturday morning, fire struck the hamlet again, in a shed owned by Hillary Parker. Investigators attributed this blaze, which spread to a garage and eventually the neighboring Adams home, again to “faulty electrical.”
“All these causes were the only probable cause at that point in time,” said Beckwith.
Even though some buildings were lost completely and homes damaged severely, no injuries were reported in the spate of fires. Bates credits that to the actions of his own department and mutual aid from Smyrna, Norwich, North Norwich and South Otselic.
While both Plymouth and Chenango County fire investigators had ruled out criminal activity in any of the recent fires, the latest incident Monday night seems to suggest otherwise.
The Chenango County Sheriff’s Department agreed to increase patrols in the Plymouth area following public outcry. Sheriff’s investigators could not be reached for comment as of press time this morning.