Belmont Fire Log: Careless Ash Disposal Sparks Christmas Day Blaze

The careless disposal of fireplace ash sparked a blaze that nearly turned Christmas Day tragic for a Horne Road resident, according to the Belmont Fire Department.

Belmont firefighters arrived at the single-family residence at 1:33 p.m. to find in the backyard a fire fully-involved and consuming several trash barrels and what Belmont Fire described as "children toys." Fire crews quickly pulled hoses and extinguished the flames and overhauled the site to check for hot spots.

The homeowner told that he had cleaned his fireplace and put the hot embers in a paper bag which he placed in the barrels. He did not believe the ash to be hot enough to catch fire. 
 
The mishandling of hot embers two years ago was the cause of a 2011 fire that killed the three daughters and parents of a Stamford, Conn. homeowner, the most notable of the 11,600 U.S. residential building fires caused by hot ashes annually.