Firefighters Squelch Second Blaze at Same Townhouse

firefighters were called early Tuesday to a local home for the second fire there in a four-day time frame.

Crews were dispatched around 5 a.m. to 18245 Murphy Circle, where a futon mattress in a garage was engulfed in flames. on Friday evening after a resident had been using a grill just outside the garage, Chief Ken Dunn said.

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"The relief valve on the propane tank let loose and then it just became a blow torch," Dunn said, of the original fire. " … A propane cylinder with the liquid propane in it that we all use for grilling can be dangerous. ... Propane, when it gets vented into the air like that, it expands 270 times. There was a second grill in the garage that also blew and vented at that time."

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Dunn called Tuesday morning's repeat fire "unusual" but said the department's investigation had been completed an no foul play was suspected. Like the first blaze, Tuesday's—potentially a flare-up from Friday—didn't spread beyond the garage. Two cars were torched in the original incident and damage estimates came in around $200,000.

"To say that it was left over from the other night, it's a possibility," he said. "I've never seen (a flare-up) come that late, four days later. I would have expected that the next morning. This is unusual, but it is what it is."

Dunn credited masonry separation walls for the fire's containment to the garage area. 

"It never breached the walls in the garage because of that construction," he said.

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