A $2.8 million mansion burned to the ground Thursday afternoon after a turkey-frying attempt in the garage sparked a massive blaze during Thanksgiving celebrations, Connecticut fire officials said.
The 10,000-square-foot home burst into flames around 3:40 p.m., with firefighters responding to an automatic alarm followed by multiple 911 calls. About 25 holiday guests escaped without injury, though the house was later deemed uninhabitable.
“When we arrived, the whole garage end of the house was on fire – like a third of the house,” Connecticut’s Weston Volunteer Fire Department Chief John Pokorny told CT Insider. “It accelerated really rapidly.”
Intense heat kept firefighters from approaching the blaze directly. A water supply line was briefly interrupted when a vehicle drove over it, complicating the response. Fire crews battled the inferno for 16 hours with assistance from neighboring departments, facing dangerous conditions and structural collapse that prevented aggressive firefighting tactics.
“Really, the issue was the fire had progressed so much by the time we arrived on scene,” Pokorny said. By Friday, only a partially burned exterior deck remained identifiable among the ruins of charred wood and furniture, according to photos published by Weston Today.
While officials believe the fire started from turkey frying in the garage, they have not announced an official cause. Firefighters remained on scene Friday extinguishing hotspots in the debris. “You get pieces of debris and it’s burning underneath and the water from the top just doesn’t get to it,” Pokorny explained.
NYPOST
