GREENFIELD — A garage belonging to a company that restores homes and buildings that have sustained smoke, fire and water damage burned to the ground early Thursday, the third time fire and rescue crews were called to the property in the past week.
Amerestore, a Greenfield-based repair company, experienced a small electrical fire in a storage building Friday afternoon, said Mike Adams, the company’s founder and president. That blaze rekindled for a short time Saturday afternoon but was doused by the Buck Creek Fire Department.
Just after 2 a.m. Thursday, firefighters returned to the property in 1600 block of N. County Road 600W, Fire Chief Dave Sutherland said. Someone driving past the business reported seeing “flames shooting out the back of the building,” according to emergency call records.
By the time crews arrived a few minutes later, the garage was fully engulfed, with heavy fire in the east end of the structure, Sutherland said.
After the first fire on Friday, the company took to parking its vehicles in an adjacent parking lot rather than in the garage. Two trucks had suffered some damage after the first blaze, Adams said.
But the garage had been used to store restoration equipment, which was all lost in Thursday’s fire, Adams said. Thursday afternoon, Adams’ team was still trying to put a price tag on the damage.
“We’re just looking to see what is missing,” Adams said, as he supervised a crew taking inventory.
The company had enough equipment on hand in another Greenfield building and in branches across the country that it will be able to continue its work, Adams said.
Adams said he suspects Thursday’s blaze was the result of another rekindle, but fire crews are still working to investigate the official cause.
That could take a few days to determine, Sutherland said. Investigators will have to uncover the cause and origin before they can decide if any criminal activity occurred, he said.
A fence will be set up around the burned building to protect the scene, and the state’s fire marshal will assist with the investigation, Sutherland said.
The Amerestore team was trying to stay positive Thursday.
“No one wants to go through this twice — or three times,” Adams said. “But this is why we have insurance.”