Stovetop fire at Sugarloaf Estates apartments in Sunderland displaces residents

SUNDERLAND — Investigators have determined that the fire at the Sugarloaf Estates apartment complex on River Road (Route 47) early Saturday morning started on a kitchen stovetop in one of the apartments.

The fire was called in at around 1:20 a.m., according to the Sunderland Fire Department, and did not result in any reported injuries to residents, firefighters or pets.

According to Deputy Fire Chief Mike Zeoli, before the first fire truck reached Building 4 at Sugarloaf Estates, a firefighter spotted flames in the windows stretching up to the roof, leading the firefighter to strike a first alarm to call in support from other departments.

Firefighters from at least 16 area departments responded, allowing first responders to contain the fire to the center section of the apartment building and limit damage to two apartments in Building 4. While firefighters first attempted to extinguish the fire from inside, the flames prevented them from entering, leading to firefighters using ladder trucks to extinguish the blaze from outside the building, Zeoli said.

According to Zeoli, the two apartments “were totally destroyed” with “little salvageable.”

The Sunderland Fire Department also called in the American Red Cross. Residents of the damaged apartments rode a Pioneer Valley Transit Authority (PVTA) bus to the First Congregational Church, where they received help from Red Cross responders.

While taking an Uber home to her apartment — two doors down from the units that caught fire — at around 1:15 a.m., University of Massachusetts Amherst sophomore Mia Snedeker was responding to texts from her concerned roommate.

“I could tell something was wrong,” Snedeker said.

As her driver approached the apartments, she spotted flames from Route 47, and the recent fires at Olympia Place in Amherst came to mind.

After staying at her parents’ home in Gill, Snedeker spent Monday packing her car with belongings coated in soot so she could wash them before moving to another building at Sugarloaf Estates.

“All my clothes smell like I walked through a bonfire, and some of my stuff is coated in the black stuff I have to wash off,” Snedeker said, noting that her apartment smells like chemicals and smoke.

“It’s definitely for us, [in] the end units, it’s more of just a major inconvenience rather than devastating,” Snedeker said after mentioning that she must navigate the fallout of the fire while studying for two exams this week. “Obviously the people that live one door down from us, they lost absolutely everything — all their clothes, all their furniture, personal belongings, everything.”

Roommates Alexia Minkin and Liv Charette, who lived one door down from the fire, were asleep when the fire alarm blared. At first, Minkin thought it was a false alarm, but while the pair sat in their car as departments responded, the severity of the fire struck them.

“We were watching the smoke and then suddenly the roof just caught fire, and we were like, ‘Oh, this is a fire, this is serious, this is really happening,” Minkin said as she and Charette packed a car with furniture. “I never felt my heart beat in my chest so hard.”

Minkin and Charette drove to their hometown of Gardner for a place to sleep on Saturday, but they and their third roommate Michael Gifford plan on booking a hotel until they can find another apartment.

According to Massachusetts Department of Fire Services spokesperson Jake Wark, investigators assigned to the State Fire Marshal’s Office and local officials determined that the fire began on a stovetop in the kitchen of one of the apartments.

“Cooking fires are by far the most common type of fires in Massachusetts and across the country,” Wark wrote in an email. “We want to remind folks to stand by their pan when cooking on the stovetop — stay in the room while the burners are on. It’s also smart to keep the area around the stove clear of food packaging, towels and anything else that can burn.”

Zeoli echoed Wark’s advice, also stressing the importance of ensuring smoke alarms are functional.

In addition to Sunderland, assisting fire departments and districts include South Deerfield, Amherst, Leverett, Whately, Montague Center, Conway, Shutesbury, Hadley, Belchertown, Northfield, Greenfield, Turners Falls, Erving, Bernardston and Northampton.

South County EMS, the Sunderland Police Department, the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency, Massachusetts State Police and the Massachusetts Department of Fire Services also provided support.

“Sunderland Fire would like to thank all the responding departments for their efforts,” Zeoli said.

Route 47 was temporarily closed during the emergency response, according to the Sunderland Police Department.