BERWICK, Maine — The apartment building blaze last month that killed Berwick Fire Capt. Joel Barnes was ignited by inadequate disposal of smoking materials, the state fire marshal's office announced Friday.
"Most probably," it said, "disposal of smoking materials into an unapproved receptacle" caused the four-alarm fire to which 16 fire departments responded.
Maine Public Safety Department spokesperson Steve McCausland said investigators believe the fire started on an outdoor porch at the back of the building's third floor.
"We assume somebody was out there smoking at some point in time," Fire Marshall Joe Thomas told the Press Herald. "It certainly is fitting of the circumstances showing what cause and origin was."
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Capt. Barnes was fatally injured in the March 1 fire while shielding a fellow firefighter. Four others were injured in the blaze.
While inside a third-floor room adjacent to the porch, after entering the building through the front door, Capt. Barnes and Firefighter Mitchell Manfredi became trapped and exit to the porch became impossible due to the volume of fire, McCausland said, citing investigators. By that time, conditions had rapidly deteriorated, making escape back through their original entry point impossible.
Barnes was found unconscious in that third-floor room, the spokesperson said. A doctor from the New Hampshire Chief Medical Examiner's Office determined his cause of death to be "probable hyperthermia and/or hypoxia."
Hyperthermia is defined as having a body temperature greatly above normal, while hypoxia is oxygen deprivation.
Barnes' manner of death was deemed accidental.
Fire investigators were unable to conclusively determine who discarded the cigarette or smoking item, the Portland Press Herald reports. No charges were expected to be filed.
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Officials used fire scene forensic exams and interviews to come to their conclusions.
McCausland said the Maine Department of Labor is conducting an independent investigation regarding equipment and labor safety standards.
He said the ATF Fire Research Laboratory is continuing to work with the data provided to come up with a computer model of the fire.
Barnes' death was the first combat line of duty death among Maine firefighters since 1988.
More than 7,000 firefighters attended a public memorial service in Portland on March 10 to honor Barnes and his family.
Assisting in the fire marshal's office with its investigation into the details of the fire is the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and detectives from the Berwick Police Department.
