ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) — The relatives of six family members unaccounted for after a massive fire gutted a waterfront mansion believe they were inside at the time of the blaze, a fire official said Tuesday.
The charred multimillion-dollar mansion near Maryland’s capital is the focus of the search for the six missing family members, said Capt. Russ Davies, a spokesman for the Anne Arundel County Fire Department.
Davies has declined to identify the family members. On Tuesday, he wouldn’t give further details about what their relatives said or why they believe the family was inside the mansion.
Davies said a search for the missing family members will begin when crews stabilize the structure and pump out tens of thousands of gallons of water from the basement — likely Wednesday.
The blaze reduced the mansion to a scorched stone framework Monday. Teddy bears and flowers now rest near the front gate and teary-eyed neighbors have stopped by.
Federal investigators were traveling to the scene from across the country Tuesday to figure out what caused the fire, which gutted the 16,000-square-foot home with seven bedrooms and 7 ½ baths. The flames took hours to put out after the fire began before dawn Monday on the outskirts of Annapolis.
“We know who’s unaccounted for,” said Davies said. “If you look at the damage, you know, it would not be a stretch to think that if there were occupants that they did not survive the fire.”
The fire was initially reported about 3:30 a.m. Monday by an alarm monitoring company and a neighbor who spotted flames at the mansion.
Online records of the Maryland Department of Assessments and Taxation list Don and Sandra Pyle as owners of the home, which the records say is their principal residence. Don Pyle was named chief operating officer of ScienceLogic last fall. The company, based in Reston, Virginia, makes software for cloud computing.
Yama Habibzai, a spokesman for ScienceLogic, confirmed in an email to The Associated Press there was a fire at Pyle’s home early Monday and that it’s under investigation. He said the company had no further comment.
Some 85 firefighters had to be called in from several jurisdictions to fight the fire. Davies said because there was no fire hydrant in the area, firefighters shuttled water tankers to the site and stationed a fire boat at a pier near the property to bring in water.
Davies said that hot spots took about ten hours to extinguish before operations were scaled back around nightfall.
Agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were on the premises Monday afternoon.
Special Agent David Cheplak, a spokesman for the ATF’s Baltimore field office, said there was no evidence at this point of foul play.
According to a 2008 story in The Baltimore Sun, the Pyles’ house, which was the site of a charity event, was described as looking like a castle, with mini-turrets, stonework and lion statues.
State property records said the two-story house was built in 2005, then listed at $4.2 million.
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Jones reported from Baltimore.
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Possibly CO poisoning first, and whatever caused that also started a fire. If they were in there, you hope that was the case so they were dead before the burned. If it was just a very fast fire and they got caught in it, that has to just be a horrible way to go. But I would think someone might have tried to call 911 if they were trapped.
Please move this to your new TPM section, The ***R***ubberneck
And if I were blowing four million bucks on a new house, I’d spend at least some of it ensuring the place exceeded minimum code for firewalls, inflammability of materials and electrical. Not criticizing the owner. Just suggesting that the fire marshal will likely be giving the remains of the house a really thorough going over for signs of arson or code violations.
Here in California, the building code requires a smoke and carbon dioxide detector in every bedroom as well as certain other common areas. They must be verified as having been installed and working whenever there is a sale. Also, if you do any work, the inspector checks that as well before they sign off on the building permit. Ours are hard-wired into the electrical system with battery back-ups, but I am not sure if that is required by code (I think so).
With these in place, even if you cannot stop the fire, it seems likely that you should be able to get out.
I wonder what MD’s rules are?
Maryland requires CO detectors “near sleeping areas” or “near” CO producing equipment. If they skimped on safety in a four million dollar house and only put them near the furnace and the gas fireplaces and the place was big enough and there were no pets in the house with more acute hearing than humans with access to the bedrooms, it’s just conceivable that the owners of gigantic home might sleep through the alarm. But I expect the fire marshal is going to be skeptical of that theory.