Anonymous
Update by the edhat staff
An attic fire destroyed a home in the 1700 block of Gillespie Street on Saturday evening.
Around midnight, Santa Barbara City firefighters responded to the area and discovered a single family residence engulfed in flames with thick smoke billowing throughout the neighborhood, between W. Islay and W. Valerio Streets.
The fire appeared to have originated in the attic and ask crews made access to the top of the structure, the roof collapsed.
Crews were able to suppress the fire around 1:30 a.m. and remained on the scene until the early morning hours.
One person was home during the time of the fire but was able to safely exit without injuries.
The official cause of the blaze is under investigation.
By an edhat reader
I was on a walk a little while ago (Sunday morning) and noticed fire trucks leaving the 1700 block of Gillsepie Street. (Santa Barbara’s westside neighborhood).
I had smelled smoke earlier but assumed it was a BBQ. Then I saw this house with a badly damaged roof. Hope everyone is ok, although it doesn’t look like anyone is home.
The photos on Noozhawk show all the stucco off the side of the building with exposed lath and plaster interior walls showing. I wonder if the fire dept did that to make sure the fire wasn’t inside the walls or was the house under construction?
We were in San Roque neighborhood last night when some “guests” set off a fire alarm at house they were unfamiliar with and the fire department was notified. Oh, the risks of STRs in high density neighborhoods.
I don’t know what STR means.
Short Term Rental
Thank you.
This is so sad. It was such a charming, very well cared for home. I live about 2 blocks away. I also heard fireworks late last night. Sounded like those things we used to call cherry bombs. I hope something didn’t land on their roof to start it. I wish the jack___es that think this is fun and entertaining would quit. Hope there is a full investigation into what caused the fire.
I heard fireworks in the neighborhood around then. I wonder if they are related.
We are a street over and were just about asleep when we started smelling it a bit past midnight. Thought it was a late night bbq at first, but the smoke quickly became overwhelming and terrible smelling. Went to the window and saw the MASSIVE blaze. We went out to the street and saw it was fully engulfed on the backside, huge flames.
In addition to the damage you see on the front of the house, there is no roof or walls left at all on the back of the house upper floor/attic. The police were knocking on doors making sure nearby neighbors were awake in case the fire spread. I heard someone mention that the occupant of the house was outside when the fire department arrived, so hopefully all people and pets were able to escape. The fire department was there all night mopping up, and has been back at least once today to check for any residual smoldering.
So very sad to see someone’s home go up in flames like that. I really hope it was not illegal fireworks that caused this.