Crime & Safety

Fire Marshal: Dogs Caused Amagansett Fire in 'Freak Accident'

Investigators believe dogs turned cooktop on when trying to get cupcakes.

The dogs that were killed in a fire in Amagansett on Friday afternoon may have actually caused it, in what Dave Browne called "a freak accident."

Browne said it wasn't initially clear what caused the , but after sifting through the rubble the day afterward, he and fire marshal Tom Baker uncovered some evidence that pointed to the dogs.

The dogs died in the back of the house, where there was the least damage, and next to their bodies, investigators found some vomit that contained dog food and cupcake wrappers.

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Two boxes of cupcakes had been left on top of a gas cooktop stove in an effort to keep them away from the dogs. One knob on the front edge of the range was turned on in the ignite position, Browne said. "Every other one was off," he said.

He said the boxes and its contents may have caught fire.

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Coupled with the fact that the occupants of the house told the investigators they couldn't think of anything they had left on, Browne said his office concluded the fire started accidentally.

"They had a habit of taking things," Browne said of the dogs, which were reportedly Labs.

He said after doing some research online, he found its not an isolated incident. Dogs have been known to start fires like this one. He said he even found a YouTube video of someone encouraging their dog to grab a dishtowel above a stove, when it turned the gas range on.

According to a police report, Peter Kraft, and his family and friends had been out with the dogs, but returned them to the house at about 1 p.m., before going out again. When they returned at about 3:30 p.m., the house was fully engulfed in flames.

Browne said they broke windows in an effort to save the dogs, though that only fed the fire more oxygen.

While the propane tank that was on the outside of the house, near where the fire started, presented a problem for the firefighters trying to knock down the flames, Browne said the tank did what it was supposed to. "It's supposed to let off pressure instead of exploding," he said.


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