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December 15, 2009
UPDATE…..Fire will keep Fessenden Center closed for some time
By IRENE NOLAN
The
fire at the Fessenden Center in the early morning hours of Saturday,
Nov. 28, is going to keep the Dare County Parks and Recreation facility
closed into next year.
Dare
County manager Bobby Outten said that the county’s fire marshal,
Doug Remaley, an assistant fire marshal who was on the scene the day of
the fire, and Buxton Fire Volunteer Fire Department Chief Bryan Perry
have all said that the fire was accidental and not arson.
Outten
said Remaley’s determination was that the fire was caused by a
cigarette that smoldered for several hours in a plastic planter on the
center’s porch.
Outten said the smoke and soot must be cleared out before any construction can start on areas damaged by the fire.
The building, he said, is covered by insurance, and an adjuster has been working with a smoke abatement company on the cleanup.
Cleaning up after the smoke will take several weeks, Outten said.
“There was a lot of smoke and soot throughout the building,” he said.
The
cleanup will involve not only the obvious cleaning of the heating and
air conditioning systems but also taking files out of cabinets to clean
them, so that the soot won’t be released again every time the
file drawers are opened. Even computers must be cleaned.
The
preliminary estimate for smoke abatement, Outten said, was about
$80,000, though the final cost will probably be somewhat less than that.
After
the smoke and soot are cleaned out, construction work will begin on the
damaged parts of the building, which are limited mostly to the outside
and the inside areas where firefighters had to break out walls and
where water damaged walls and ceilings.
Outten
said there is no estimate yet on the reconstruction work. Nor does he
have any good estimate yet for when work will be finished and the
center re-opened.
Meanwhile, the staff of the Fessenden Center has relocated to the old county building next to RBC Bank in Buxton.
Programs are being held around the community.
The
recreational basketball league teams for youngsters are practicing at
Cape Hatteras Elementary School, and the games will be Cape Hatteras
Secondary School of Coastal Studies.
Some
of the adult exercise classes have been moved to the
Rodanthe-Waves-Salvo Community Building and the Hatteras Village
Community Center.
For more information on the Fessenden Center programs during the building repairs, call 475-5650.
November 28, 2009
Fire damages Fessenden Center in Buxton, closing it for up to a week
An early morning fire of yet undetermined origin damaged the Fessenden Center in Buxton on Saturday, Nov. 28.
Though the interior of the building was not damaged, there is enough
residual smoke to keep the center closed for several days and maybe up
to a week.
Bryan Perry, chief of the Buxton Volunteer Fire Department, said the call came in about 2:10 a.m.
When the Buxton volunteers arrived, Perry said, there were flames
showing on a public building and a second alarm went out, which brought
the Avon and Frisco volunteer fire department.
Perry said the fire was under control in “just a few
minutes,” but fire volunteers remained on the scene until about
5:30 a.m.
Most of the damage, he said, was to the porch, deck, and façade
of the building, although there was some smoke and water damage inside.
The cause of the fire is still under investigation, Perry said, by the Dare County Fire Marshal’s Office.
“I have no reason to believe that it was arson,” Perry added.
He said Dare County Emergency Medical Service and the Sheriff’s Office also responded to the fire call.
Programs and events at the Fessenden Center are cancelled for the week
at this point, said Tim White, public services director for the Dare
County Parks and Recreation Department, who was still on the scene
Saturday afternoon.
“We will be back in there as soon as we can,” White said.
He added that he thought it was possible that the center would be closed less than a week.
“There was no structural damage,” he said. “We just need to get the smoke out of there.”
White said the county would pursue relocating programs to other venues, perhaps schools, on Monday.
There were no damage estimates today, as the county awaited the arrival of an insurance adjuster.
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