Backyard barbecue grill causes fire that spread to two North Portland homes

PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — A two-alarm fire spread across two homes in North Portland’s Humboldt neighborhood prompted response from emergency crews early Saturday morning.

At around 5 a.m., Portland firefighters responded the 4700 block of North Michigan Avenue on reports of a barbecue grill on fire in a backyard.

On arrival, they found flames coming from the back of one house, which were beginning to spread to another home nearby.

“They did get to the other house, and therefore they called for a second alarm for more resources,” Lt. Terry Foster with PF&R said. “Basically, you’re working two incidents when it goes from one house to another. So crews that are working on the first house have to focus on extinguishing and searching that house as they called for the second one, they shifted resources so they could work on the second incident.”

The first arriving crews worked to prevent further spread of the flames to the neighboring house, while also putting out the fire in the first home and searching for any residents.

Once the fire spread to the neighboring home, it was upgraded to second-alarm, bringing more crews and equipment to successfully extinguish the blaze.

While there were no injuries reported, two pets were killed in the fire, officials said.

Authorities say the fire was accidental, but the specific cause is still under investigation.

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