Investigators believe a fire that gutted a small home on Hawthorne Avenue was caused by a man trying to defrost a frozen pipe with an industrial grade heat gun.
The blaze has been ruled accidental.
They arrived to see a small, single-family apartment on fire.
The structure looked like a shed, and was about six feet behind the property’s main house — but Fire Marshal Phil Hawks said the structure was a legal residence and was listed on city property documents.
An electrician who rented the space got out of the house without injury, though Hawks noted his face was covered in soot and his hair was singed.
The electrician’s story about what happened has changed a few times during interviews. Hawks said they hope to talk to him one more time, but it appears the home lost water overnight because of a frozen pipe.
Hawks said his office found an industrial-grade heat gun at the spot where the fire is believe to have started.
“It looks like he was trying to defrost the pipe,” Hawks said.
The fire marshal further theorized that the electrician was lying on his bed in a back bedroom, close to where the fire started.
“He stated to one of my guys that he grabbed a towel and threw it on there, then went to get another one but by then the fire was too big,” Hawks said.
The fire marshal said he doesn’t know specifically what the heat gun set on fire.
“He was lucky to get out of there,” Hawks said. “Once the fire was noticed, he didn’t make a quick exit out of there to call the fire department. He tried to fight it.”