Fire Erupts in Shopping Plaza Office

Dentist Saul Sloan said he smelled a strange odor in his office at about 4:15 p.m. but he couldn’t quite pinpoint what it was, even after checking to make sure all of his equipment had been turned off and that there was nothing flammable left out. So he opened the window to his office slightly to allow the odor to escape and then turned off the lights and left.

A couple of hours later, former town attorney Fred Martin, who has a practice in the same plaza at 450 Monroe Turnpike, was on the phone when he heard a “bang” and then the alarm went off. The alarm sounding didn’t concern him at first.

“The alarm goes off a lot,” he said, adding he then got up to open the door and leave his office when he was greeted by a plumb of smoke. “I opened the doorway and the hallway was filled with smoke,” he said.

Martin said he ran out down the stairs and fled from the building. There may have been one or two other people in the building at the time, but all escaped unharmed, officials said.

By the time firefighters arrived at 6:48 p.m., flames had fully engulfed Sloan’s office and posed a danger of consuming the other business in the shopping plaza.

“There was a lot of fire showing,” Monroe fire department spokesman Kevin Catalano said.

Because it was a commercial fire, departments from Trumbull and other neighboring municipalities were called to the scene, bringing a cadre of people, equipment and other resources that were able to get the blaze under control in less than an hour.

The timing was just right as many volunteer firefighters were just getting home from work and were able to respond to the scene, Catalano said.

“The guys knocked it down pretty quickly,” he said. “We had a lot of people here pretty quickly.

In addition to the fire crews, dozens of bystanders also descended on the scene to watch, including friends Maria Bigelow and Luisa Albuquerque who walked to the scene.

“There were flames shooting out the window,” Bigelow said. “The firemen were up on the roof.”

Catalano said the area also hosts two nearby fire hydrants, which meant crews didn't have to worry about bringing in tankers and could focus on bringing the blaze under control quickly.

“We made a good stop,” he said.

In addition to crews that responded to the scene, neighboring fire departments, including Botsford in Newtown, also responded to firehouses in Monroe to cover the rest of the town while crews were out on the scene.

Officials said they believe the fire began in the dentist's office, but that the fire marshal was still investigating the cause.