Sprinkler system was turned off before fire at Beach complex

Virginia Beach

Two employees of the apartment complex that caught fire Tuesday were charged Thursday with failing to notify the Fire Department that they had turned off the building’s sprinkler system earlier in the day, an action officials said allowed the blaze to grow much bigger.

About 50 people were displaced by the fire at Marina Shores Apartment Homes, which destroyed 11 units and forced tenants to leave 13 others, said Reta Lane, regional manager of the complex. No one was hurt.

The maintenance supervisor and site manager turned off the sprinkler system in the building around 11:30 a.m. after a tenant complained of a leak, said Battalion Chief David Hutcheson, spokesman for the Virginia Beach Fire Department.

Minutes after the fire started around 4:30 p.m., the employees turned the sprinkler system back on, but it was too late, Hutcheson said. A smoldering cigarette or cigar in an ash tray on a balcony started the blaze, he said.

The two employees, whom Fire Department officials wouldn’t name, are scheduled to be in court Jan. 31. Each faces a pair of Class I misdemeanor charges: failure to maintain a fire suppression system and failure to notify the Fire Department when a system is taken out of service, both violations of the Virginia Statewide Fire Prevention Code.

The employees left a message with a private firm that oversees the complex’s sprinkler systems that they turned them off, but did not contact the Fire Department, Lane said.

“That was the step that was missed,” she said. “It boils down to training your people. I hope everybody in the industry will take this as a lesson. The chances were a million to one, and unfortunately it got us.”

Aaron Applegate, (757) 222-5122,

aaron.applegate@pilotonline.com