Investigation begins in Nahant fire

NAHANT – A two alarm blaze essentially gutted a two story home on Castle Road and sent thick gray brown smoke billowing down Black Rock Beach Tuesday afternoon.Nahant Fire Chief Ed Hyde said the 911 call came in at 2:30 p.m. for reports of a house fire at 37?Castle Road.”On our arrival there was heavy smoke and fire so we went immediately to a second alarm,” he said.View photos from the sceneCompanies from Lynn, Swampscott and Marblehead responded but Hyde said the fire grew so fast that within minutes he had to pull everyone out of the building. As firefighters cut holes in the roof, smoke pushed out between melted slats of siding up above the second-floor porch on the Castle Road side of the home.”It was pushing out of every side of the building and had started to burn the roof,” Hyde said.No one was home at the time of the blaze but a plumber had reportedly been working in the building earlier in the day. Hyde said he was not sure if the worker was in the house when the fire started. He said the fire started on the first floor in the kitchen area but investigators are still determining the cause.Neighbors said that the house was a summer home but Hyde could not confirm the report.”Nobody was home,” he said. “We’re in the beginning phases of the investigation.”According to Patriot Properties, the home sold just one year ago for $479,125 and was recently assessed at $562,000.Marisa Waite and her dad Bill Waite stood across the street, where the heat of the fire could be felt, watching the blaze. Bill Waite said he was picking up his daughter at nearby Johnson School and heard the fire on the scanner.View Fire on Castle Road in Nahant in a larger mapMarisa Waite, a fifth-grader, called the fire “very big” but said it was not the first she had seen. Bill Waite said he and his daughter also saw the fire that took out several businesses on Humphrey Street about two years ago. Marisa Waite said Tuesday’s fire was kind of scary but admitted it was also exciting.”As long as it’s not your house or someone you know it’s exciting,” she said.”And as long as no one gets hurt,” he father chimed in.One neighbor who declined to give her name said she was stunned when she returned home from shopping and saw her street filled with fire trucks and rescue vehicles.”My phone has been ringing like crazy with people asking if we saw the fire, but we weren’t home,” she said.When she saw the commotion she worried that it was her own home on fire.”I never dreamed this would happen,” she said. “We all watch each other’s houses, we all have keys to each other’s homes.”Firefighters closed off the lower part of Castle Road just after Ward Road up to a few houses past Fox Hill Road for about three hours while they battled the blaze.As flames shot out of the roof of the home another onlooker shook his head and said, “they’re going to lose that house.”Hyde said he was proud of the job the firefighters did, knocking down the fire in a little over an hour and grateful for the help from surrounding communities.Selectman Richard Lombard, who along with Town Administrator Andrew Bisignani came to examine the scene, echoed Hyde’s statement.”I’m proud of the firefighters,” Lombard said. “And very grateful that no one got hurt.”Chris Stevens can be reached at [email protected].