Fire Damages Home On Alexandia Drive

The Nantucket Fire Department responded to a house fire at 3 Alexandia Drive Thursday evening. The house is owned by former Select Board member Melissa Murphy and her husband Devon, who were off-island. The fire was spotted by a neighbor who could smell the smoke and called the station, fire chief Michael Cranson said.

“There is a lot of damage throughout the house. A lot of smoke damage,” Cranson said. “It was pretty straight forward as a neighbor spotted smoke coming out of ends of the house so we came down and there was a package in a box that was placed up against a propane stove that was off, but apparently the propane stove kicked on at some point and the box that was surrounding the item went up in flames.”

Cranson said there was a lot of smoke throughout the home but credited his crews for doing a great job knocking the fire down quickly.

“We spent a majority of the time getting the smoke out of the house,” he said. “Nobody got hurt. We tried not to damage anything and water (usage) was minimal just because it was that one area that was on fire.”

Cranson said the neighbor who reported the fire prevented the situation from being much worse with their swift report.

“We were lucky. If this had been in the middle of the night or something, or if this wasn’t discovered as quickly as it was by a good samaritan, it could have been a lot worse,” Cranson said.

Nobody was home at the time the fire. The NFD responded with three engines, two cruisers, and over 15 firefighters. NPD was also on scene with two officers.