Strong Wind Helps Fire Consume Two Houses

High winds accelerated the spread of a massive fire in Anne Arundel County that burned two houses to the ground and severely damaged a third, authorities said yesterday.

The five-alarm blaze Sunday night in the bayside community of Oyster Harbor, outside Annapolis, drew about 100 firefighters and threatened to spread across the street before it was contained, authorities said. People inside the three houses escaped unhurt.

The firefighters "were essentially fighting this fire as if it was coming out of a blowtorch," said Matthew Tobia, a battalion chief with the county fire department. Fire normally burns upward, he said. "In this case, the wind was pushing the fire straight across the road -- 30 feet -- at a height of approximately 15 feet."

The fire started in a two-story, single-family home in the 3300 block of Shore Drive and quickly spread to a house next door and then the house next to that. It also destroyed three cars.

A fireboat was used to pump water from the Chesapeake Bay because the neighborhood does not have hydrants.

Heat from the fire was melting the siding on houses across the street, Tobia said. Fearing that those structures, too, would soon combust, firefighters sprayed water on them as part of their efforts to stop the spread of the fire.

The intense heat burst a water supply hose, Tobia said, blistered a firetruck's paint and melted the truck's emergency light, but firefighters were able to restore the water supply and control the blaze.

The fire appears to be accidental and investigators are trying to determine its origin, Tobia said. Damage was estimated at $2 million.

Anne Arundel firefighters were joined by firefighters from the Annapolis, U.S. Naval Academy, Queen Anne's County and Calvert County departments. The blaze was contained at 12:22 a.m., about two hours after it was first reported, and was under control at 1:22 a.m., Tobia said.

Tobia said some neighborhood residents questioned why firefighters at a certain point stopped concentrating on the two worst-hit structures on Shore Drive and turned their attention to the third structure and the homes across the street. "We chose to save the homes that were not on fire, which is a standard firefighting strategy and tactic," he said.

Staff writer William Wan contributed to this report.