PORT ANGELES — The cause of a Tuesday night fire that destroyed two businesses in a building on Marine Drive remained unknown on Wednesday as tenants returned to pick up the pieces of what was left.
“Like anyone else, I wasn’t sure what to do,” said Jesse Bay, owner of Jesse Bay Cabinetry, as he was loading band saws and other equipment salvaged from the ruins into a truck on Wednesday.
Bay’s cabinet workshop at 932 Marine Drive and a Kaman Industrial Technologies office, next door at 930 Marine Drive, were destroyed by the fire, which was discovered at about 9:15 p.m.
Firefighters extinguished the blaze by about 1 a.m. Wednesday, and contained it so that it didn’t spread to the offices of three other tenants in the building: Mark’s Mobile Tune, a state Department of Fish and Wildlife office, and Washington Fire & Safety Equipment.
“They did everything right,” said Cecil Yother, who owns the building with his wife, Frances Yother.
“The good thing is, no one was hurt.”
The last person in the building on Tuesday had left about two hours before the fire was discovered, Clallam County Fire Marshal Ken Dubuc said.
No sprinkler or alarm
The building had neither a sprinkler system nor fire alarm.
Neither Dubuc nor Port Angeles Fire Chief Dan McKeen knew when or where the fire started.
Dubuc said it could have begun at any time after the last person left the building.
McKeen said in a written statement that it is likely the fire went undetected for a “considerable period of time.”
The investigation into the cause will begin Friday.
Cecil Yother said it would take between four and six months to repair the building. He couldn’t estimate on Wednesday how much repairs will cost.
He will have a fire alarm system installed, he said, but not a sprinkler system because that would require a 5-inch water main. Such a main isn’t connected to the building.
Dubuc said the city of Port Angeles does not require the building to have a sprinkler system or a fire alarm because it is under 6,250 square feet.
Wants to return
Bay plans to set up shop again in the location as soon as he can, but his primary focus in the meantime is completing cabinets for his customers.
“My first priority is to get what they need, when they need it done,” he said.
Bay said he already had received offers for a temporary workplace.
“I’m overwhelmed by the support,” he said before walking back into his burnt-out workplace.
John Briggs, Kaman operations manager in Tacoma, said the location in Port Angeles sold bearings and power transmission products to companies such as Nippon Paper Industries USA Co., and Interfor Pacific.
Now the company will sell those products to its Port Angeles customers through its Tacoma office.
Briggs said he didn’t know if Kaman will return to the Marine Drive office after it is repaired or seek a new location in Port Angeles.
“I have not heard what command has in mind for that,” he said.
Dubuc said the Fire Department will begin its investigation on Friday because that is when the insurance companies of the tenants and the building owners will send independent investigators to the scene.
“My philosophy has always been: if the insurance companies are going to assign individual investigators, that we do it all together,” Dubuc said.
Dubuc said that a boom truck may be needed to remove pieces of the roof that are at risk of falling while the investigation is being conducted.
He said that would be done at the expense of the insurance companies.
Dubuc said that sprinkler systems contain about 97 percent of fires.
Washington Fire & Safety Equipment, located at the building, provides both sprinkler systems and fire alarms.
“The irony is, if there were either of these types of systems, it is more than likely it would not have been near the fire that we had now,” Dubuc said.
Fire fighters with Clallam County Fire Districts 2 and 3 assisted the Port Angeles Fire Department.
Briggs said Kaman customers in Port Angeles can contact the Tacoma office at 1-800-423-7832.
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Reporter Tom Callis can be reached at 360-417-3532 or at tom.callis@peninsuladailynews.com.
