By Joseph Deinlein
The Evening Sun
GETTYSBURG, Pa. — One thing seems certain: A discarded cigarette butt sparked a fire Sunday that caused damage to an apartment housing 17 Gettysburg College students.
But Gettysburg Police Officer Larry Weikert, the police department’s fire investigator and the former borough fire chief, said a bird might have played a part in the 33 W. Middle St. blaze.
The fire started between the first and second floor beneath an upstairs porch, fire officials said shortly after the 4:15 p.m. fire was extinguished.
All of the students were quickly evacuated and two students — one of whom lived there — used fire extinguishers in an attempt to douse the flames before firefighters arrived.
After investigating, Weikert said the cause is being ruled accidental. It appears the cigarette had ignited leaves and other debris under the porch next to a bird’s nest.
“I don’t think (the cigarette) got there by flicking it,” he said Wednesday.
Why?
“There was no way to get there by flicking it,” he said.
He said it is possible a bird picked up the discarded butt and took it under the porch.
“I don’t know how else it could have gotten there, but there’s no way to know for sure,” he said, stressing there is no evidence for or against it.
However, most anyone who has passed third grade knows birds build nests in the spring, and the fire occurred April 25.
And it’s not unheard of for birds to pick up discarded smoldering cigarettes and spark fires.
A 1970 report by two Penn State University professors entitled “The Role of Bird Management in Fire Protection” found that birds used cigarette filters in their nests in place of fluffy air-born seeds and plant material.
The study said it is tough to say positively that birds caused some of the approximately 218,000 miscellaneous fires in 1968. However, the professors calculated conservatively that, if even 1 percent of those fires was caused by a bird picking up a discarded butt, it accounted for about $8.5 million in damages that year.
“Now this is a figure you can’t sneeze at,” the researchers said.
Other contemporary news reports cite birds as the cause of fires. For example, a March 28, 2003, fire in Harrisburg is believed to have been started by birds.
The fire chief at the time said a large birds’ nest was found in the ceiling of the house and that no other possible sources of the fire in the area.
“The nest was 60 percent consumed and we weren’t able to interview the bird,” Chief Donald Konkle told the Associated Press for story at the time. “I believe he’s homeless.”
But perhaps it isn’t fair to single out birds.
Fire investigators determined an April 8 fire at The Christmas Haus in New Oxford likely was caused by other animals.
“Squirrels,” Pennsylvania State Police Fire Marshal Jeff Sarver told The Evening Sun for a story after inspecting the scene at 110 Lincolnway West. “I’ve seen it before.”
After finding several dead squirrels in the attic, Sarver surmised the animals chewed through wiring in the old house.
When owner Roger Lund opened an upstairs closet at about 10:30 a.m., he introduced a rush of oxygen into a pocket of heat that previously formed around the chewed wire, Sarver said, and that was enough to ignite a fire.
The second floor of the building, which was a living quarters full of antique furniture and family heirlooms, was destroyed.
In the Gettysburg fire, the damage was contained to the porch.
A Gettysburg fire investigator believes a bird may have carried a cigarette into its nest causing the Sunday fire on West Middle Street.
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