The Nov. 26 fire that killed a Clarence woman and four of her dogs and caused $1 million in damage was sparked by a chimney failure in a home that lacked working smoke detectors, an Erie County Sheriff’s Office fire investigator said Tuesday.
An investigation determined that an issue within the chimney’s infrastructure allowed built-up heat from the fireplace to escape and caused the blaze that heavily damaged the home in the Spaulding Lake neighborhood, Detective Scott Kuhlmey told The Buffalo News.
“It allows your gases and your embers and everything that would normally go up the chimney pipe and out the roof through the stack to go outside of the chimney pipe and get into the wall,” he said.
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Further, Kuhlmey said smoke alarms in the home did not activate at the time, though he declined to say whether anyone deliberately deactivated the devices prior to the fire.
Joan S. Wozer, 62, died in the fire at 4720 Spaulding Drive. She was a nurse at John R. Oishei Children’s Hospital and other facilities and was well known for her passion for breeding golden retrievers.
Three people – including Wozer’s husband, Greg – and another dog managed to escape.
It was the first of two fires within two weeks in the town that started in a chimney or fireplace, Clarence Fire Chief Brett Hanford said.
Hanford previously told The Buffalo News that, when he arrived at the Spaulding Drive home at 2:43 a.m., the first floor was fully engulfed, with fire billowing through bay windows, the front door and second-floor windows.
His company was joined by Clarence Center and Main-Transit firefighters just a few minutes after the 911 call.
The fire appeared to have originated in the rear right of the house, he said, because that area had the “highest concentration of char.”
Given the size of the home and volume of fire, Hanford quickly called for second and third alarms, which led to assistance from Harris Hill, Newstead, East Amherst and Swormville fire companies.
An unsuccessful rescue attempt was made for Joan Wozer, who was in a second-floor bedroom, by dousing the flames as a ladder was set up.
The $1 million in damage was split between $700,000 in structural damage and $300,000 in contents.
A town code enforcement officer deemed the home uninhabitable on the day of the fire.
“The house is more than likely beyond repair,” town spokesman Kevin Keenan said, but any decision on demolition is in the hands of Greg Wozer.
The Spaulding Drive home had a wood-burning fireplace, with a natural gas starter, and a clay-lined chimney, officials said.
Sheriff’s fire investigators determined the family had set a fire in the fireplace on the afternoon of Nov. 25 and kept it going into the evening, Kuhlmey said.
At some point overnight, a failure in the chimney – in the flue or another component of the chimney structure – created a gap allowing heat that had built up to escape, Kuhlmey said.
“There’s a lot of different components. You’ve got the firebox that goes to your chimney pipe and there’s different parts within that section,” he said. “So it was between the firebox and the chimney pipe.”
This sparked the fire on the first floor that soon raged through the home and trapped Joan Wozer in her upstairs bedroom.
“Based upon our investigation, we received information that smoke detectors did not activate,” Kuhlmey said.
He declined to reveal why and for how long the home lacked working smoke detectors.
Hanford declined to comment on the status of the smoke detectors, deferring to the Sheriff’s Office.
However, both men emphasized the value of having functioning smoke detectors in a home, checking them regularly and replacing their batteries twice a year.
“Having an operable smoke alarm probably would have helped with learning about the fire earlier,” Kuhlmey said.
Kuhlmey and Hanford pointed to a fire that started just after 2:30 a.m. Monday and caused $90,000 damage to a home, and its contents, at 10620 Clarence Center Road.
That fire began in the fireplace and extended to the wall around it, according to Hanford and the Amherst Central Fire Alarm Office.
In this case the home had working smoke alarms, which helped limit the damage to the structure and ensured no one was injured or killed in the fire.
“They were awakened to the smoke detectors, things of that nature, so the whole family was able to evacuate the house,” the fire chief said.
This is one of several safety tips Kuhlmey and Hanford offered for a season when fireplace and chimney fires become more common.
They urged homeowners to get their chimneys regularly inspected and cleaned and to use properly seasoned firewood – hardwoods such as maple or oak are best – to start fires in a wood-burning fireplace.
They also urged caution in waiting until a fire’s ashes and embers have completely cooled before removing and disposing of them.
News Staff Reporter Ben Tsujimoto contributed to this report.