A teenage girl playing with a lighter started a fire that caused around $275,000 in damage to her family’s Oceanside home Monday and left the family in need of temporary housing.
The girl, whose name and age were withheld, lit some paper on fire then dropped it in her bedroom at the single-story home in the 1200 block of Holly Street near Laurel Street around 6 p.m., according to Battalion Chief Pete Lawrence of the Oceanside Fire Department. The fire quickly spread to the curtains.
She alerted a man working in the garage that her room had caught fire and he tried to put out the blaze with a portable extinguisher. However, the flames and smoke became unbearable and he ran out, Lawrence said.
Someone told authorities a woman was trapped inside the burning home, but the report turned out to be unfounded, Lawrence said. The teen and two adults escaped uninjured.
Lawrence said crews had the blaze under control in about 30 minutes. It destroyed all but the garage and one bedroom and caused around $200,000 in damage to the structure and another $75,000 in damage to the contents.
One of the adults, a woman who was asleep as the fire started, was evaluated by paramedics at the scene and was later taken to a local hospital by family members for treatment of an undisclosed medical condition, Lawrence said.
— City News Service