LAWRENCE: Fountayne Lane house destroyed by fire

By Lea Kahn, Staff Writer
   The cause of a fast-moving fire that destroyed a home early Monday morning in the Liberty Greene development, off Lawrence Station Road, has not been determined and remains under investigation, according to Lawrence Township fire officials.
   The two occupants of the house at 126 Fountayne Lane escaped unharmed, after smoke detectors alerted them to the 12:20 a.m. fire, said Lawrence Township Fire Marshal Dale Robbins.
   ”Smoke detectors save lives,” he said. “The fire had a good head start (before it was discovered by the homeowner). Without the smoke detectors, there might have been a different outcome.”
   Homeowner William Schuler was reading in his second-floor bedroom when he heard a battery operated smoke detector go off, Mr. Robbins said.
   Mr. Schuler’s wife and children were out of town, and his father was staying with him in the house, which is at the rear of the housing development.
   Thinking that the alarm was caused by a defective battery, Mr. Schuler went to check on it, Mr. Robbins said. As he started down the steps to the first floor, all of the hard-wired smoke detectors began to sound off. When he opened the door to the laundry room, he saw smoke and flames.
   Mr. Schuler went to the garage to get a fire extinguisher to put out the flames, but the fire had already spread to the garage, he said. Mr. Schuler alerted his father, who was asleep in another second-floor bedroom, and the two men left the house.
   Meanwhile, the first call to the emergency services dispatcher from the homeowner’s burglar and fire alarm monitoring company at 12:20 a.m. indicated that it was a smoke detector activation. When Police Officer Shaun Sexton, who was on patrol in the area, was sent to check on it, he reported that the house was engulfed in flames. He had arrived on the scene at 12:23 a.m.
   The Slackwood Volunteer Fire Co. and the Lawrence Road Fire Co. had already been dispatched at 12:22 a.m. for the alarm activation. When it was determined that the house was on fire, the Lawrenceville Fire Co., the Prospect Heights Volunteer Fire Co., which is based in Ewing Township, and Hamilton Township Ladder 14 were dispatched at 12:24 a.m.
   The first of the seven fire trucks arrived at the scene at 12:33 a.m., but the fire had already burned through the roof. The owner’s vehicle, which had been parked in the driveway, also was burning. The heat from the fire melted the siding on the two adjacent houses, and also scorched the landscaping.
   The fire was declared under control at 1:11 a.m., but firefighters stayed on the scene to make certain that the flames had been extinguished and there were no “hot spots” that could re-ignite the fire. The last fire truck left Fountayne Lane at 4:27 a.m.