A fire early Tuesday evening, Nov. 24, completely gutted the 4,200 square-foot steel building that housed Cranberry Road Winery and Bog Water Brewing Company at the corner of SR105 and S. Forrest Street at the Grayland ‘T’ in rural Westport. The property is owned by Westport residents Chris and Maria Tiffany, who opened for business at that location in October of 2012.
Quick response
The fire call came in at 6:02 p.m. with a report that the building was already fully engulfed in flames at that time. Firefighters from all South Beach fire districts responded to the call with a command unit on scene in six minutes and the first engine company carrying four personnel arriving at 6:10 p.m.
“On our arrival on-scene, the structure was 80% to 90% involved, so we set up for a defensive attack,” said Westport Fire Chief Dennis Benn.
A total of 27 fire and Emergency Medical Service personnel responded to and fought the blaze.
No one inside
According to Chris Tiffany, he learned of the fire when a friend called him at about 6:15 p.m. He reported that no employees were working when the fire started. Tiffany said that the winery and brewery, normally open until 8 p.m., closed early on Tuesday because business was slow.
Several explosions
Witnesses reported hearing several explosions during the blaze, one or more of which simultaneously blew off all three of the large front bay doors at approximately 6:30 p.m.
The fire was officially declared out at 10 p.m. with the majority of personnel clearing the scene at that time.
“We left a manned apparatus on-scene throughout the night, because we knew that there were going to be flare-ups from areas that were not fully extinguished,” said Benn.
Cause still undetermined
The owner’s insurance company hired Unified Investigations & Sciences Inc., to determine the cause of the fire. A company investigator was at the property on Monday with Chief Benn. Because of the fire’s intensity and the extensive damage to the building and its contents, the cause of the blaze has not yet been determined.
“The investigator has identified an area of origin, but the structure has been damaged so badly, he will not go inside and dig any deeper at this time,” said Benn.
“The company is in the process of obtaining demolition permits from Grays Harbor County and the Olympic Region Clean Air Agency (ORCAA) so they can bring in equipment to remove the roof and walls in a systematic and safe manner in order to gain better access to the area of the fire’s origin,” he said.
Cost of loss
The day after the fire, Tiffany said that with the total loss of the building and all its contents, they are facing an estimated $2 million loss. He said that he and his wife plan to rebuild, and also expressed concern for employees who now are out of work.
Donations pouring in
In an effort to help the couple out, close friend Dan Lindgren started a GoFundMe page to accept donations for the Tiffanys. According to a Facebook post by Lindgren, “Our goal with this campaign is to ease some of the financial pain over the holidays for the Tiffany family and perhaps help with some planning and or permitting costs to start the rebuilding process.”
The day after the site went live, Chris Tiffany posted the following: “I would like everyone to know that we intend to use these funds to cover the lost wages for all the employees of the winery. It’s always hard times when people lose a source of income, but most difficult during the holidays.
“Thank you to everyone that donated,” he said.
As we went to press, the GoFundMe account had received more than $4,000 in donations.
Building business
The Tiffanys bought the 10-acre property in 2011 and opened the winery operation in October of 2012, offering their own cranberry-based wines. They started offering craft beers and ciders in mid-2013, adding the first of several of their own Bog Water Brewing Co. ales and craft beers in early 2014.
The addition of a large patio in early July of last year followed by a wood-fired pizza trailer brought in even more business. According to Tiffany, the couple had plans in the works for expanding their small tasting room in the near future in order to accommodate more customers inside the building.