Fire that ripped through Fall River assisted living facility may have been sparked by smoking materials, oxygen machine

An American flag and other items served as a memorial outside Gabriel House on TuesdayDavid L Ryan/ Globe Staff

FALL RIVER — Investigators may never know for certain what sparked the fire here, on the left side of the U-shaped assisted living facility.

But as they sifted through the charred and waterlogged remains of a room on the second floor of Gabriel House for clues, they ruled out some possible culprits and discovered evidence of what officials say could have been a hazardous mix: medical oxygen and smoking.

A scooter, damaged in the fire, was not to blame, they said. It wasn’t a faulty stove or electrical outlet, nor was it a candle or stick of incense, they said.

But they zeroed in on “numerous smoking materials” found in the room where investigators said the fire started, as well as an oxygen concentrator, a medical device that increases the amount of oxygen in the air a patient breathes and can fuel flames when exposed to embers.

They can’t ask the person who lived there, whom they didn’t identify, what happened. The room’s resident, along with nine others from Gabriel House, perished.

More than a week after the deadly July 13 fire, which also sent more than 30 people to area hospitals, a clearer picture of what happened that night has begun to come into focus.

Also becoming clearer are plans designed to keep similar disasters from happening elsewhere, and to determine how accountability might be meted out after a tragedy that has devastated loved ones and captured the attention of decision-makers across the state.

Bristol County District Attorney Thomas M. Quinn III (right) held a news conference on Tuesday related to the preliminary findings of the Gabriel House Assisted Living Facility fire. At the podium, Fall River Fire Chief Jeffrey Bacon (left) and Massachusetts State Fire Marshal Jon Davine.David L Ryan/ Globe Staff

Either improper disposal of smoking materials or a malfunction with the oxygen concentrator are believed to be to blame for the fire, Jon Davine, the state fire marshal, said Tuesday. But officials said that however it began, concentrated oxygen in that and other rooms in the building likely fueled the fire and that the building’s “oxygen-rich environment” helped it spread.

Oxygen concentrators, stationery medical devices, like the one found in the room where the fire started are prescribed to people with breathing issues. They remove nitrogen and other gases from the air and increase its content of oxygen.

Home oxygen can also be hazard, said Davine, who said that over the past decade in Massachusetts, it had contributed to at least “20 fire deaths and more than three dozen injuries.”

Health professionals, including those at the Cleveland Clinic, say oxygen devices and tanks should be kept far away from cigarettes, stoves, and electronic devices such as hair driers and heated blankets, as well as flammable substances including gasoline or rubbing alcohol.

And although they can’t say conclusively if tobacco use sparked the incident, Davine said the fire should reinforce the dangers of lighting up near gases used in health care.

“Smoking is especially dangerous when home oxygen is in use,” he said. “No one should smoke around medical oxygen.”

The fire has brought new attention — and funding — to fire safety and fire response, amid lingering questions about whether the building was safe and whether first responders were equipped well enough to respond to a catastrophe of its scale.

“No family, no resident, no community should ever have to suffer or live with fear that something like this could happen to them or to their loved one,” Governor Maura Healey said outside Fall River City Hall Tuesday.

She announced the state would help Fall River’s efforts to shore up its Fire Department, giving the city $1.2 million to hire more personnel. Other cities will receive similar funding to hire more emergency responders, Healey said, adding that a new initiative launched this week would review fire safety at assisted living facilities statewide.

Inquiries into the Gabriel House fire, and how so many people could die there so quickly, are far from over.

Investigators have been probing, among other things, whether the sprinkler system operated properly to douse the flames. They have removed dozens of sprinkler heads from the building to probe a possible “manufacturing issue” with them, according to George K. Regan Jr., a Gabriel House spokesperson. The devices had been tested by the sprinkler vendor just days before the fire and found to be “in working order,” Regan said.

Signs of potential legal battles began to emerge as well, in the form of the first known lawsuit to be filed in the wake of the tragedy. Steven Oldrid, a 69-year-old Gabriel House resident, alleged in a complaint filed Monday that the facility was not properly managed or maintained and that “emergency response procedures were not in place.”

His lawyer, Robin Gouveia, has alleged the facility had a no-smoking rule, but that it wasn’t enforced, and that the building had “no effective evacuation plan.”

“If there was a better plan, this might not have happened,” Gouveia said.

Bristol District Attorney Thomas Quinn said he “wouldn’t comment” on whether the building had such a policy on smoking.

“This investigation is ongoing. It involves a lot of many different aspects to it, and we’re going to continue to investigate,” Quinn said.

Regan, the Gabriel House spokesperson, declined to comment on the specific allegations, saying only, “In this situation, there is nothing else to say.”

The building was once a refuge, if an imperfect one, for people with myriad health and mobility issues, the kind of place where Vietnam veterans reminisced and residents quickly formed lasting bonds.

It was empty and quiet on Tuesday, boarded up and hemmed in for now by a perimeter of chain-link fencing, which has been accumulating small memorials to the dead.

A sign reading “Fall River Strong. The ‘Spindle City’ will NEVER forget” hangs near rosary beads and a cross decorated with the words “God - RIP - Bless to All.”

On a bouquet of sunflowers was a black-and-white photo of a man in military fatigues, and a message: “Rest in Peace Uncle Bob.”

One of the first funerals for a victim, Rui A. Albernaz, is scheduled for Wednesday, at 10 a.m. at the Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption.

Meanwhile, stories of heroism and bravery on the part of rescuers, civilian and otherwise, have continued to emerge.

Cleber Parra, a 40-year-old construction worker who lives nearby, can still remember the pleas for help.

He had been playing late-night volleyball with some friends in his backyard when they heard sirens from passing fire engines, which he initially shrugged off.

“It was nothing crazy,” he thought. Then, hearing people crying out just a short distance away, they grabbed ladders from atop his van and ran to the scene, he said. Soon he was looking through a window at a terrified elderly resident who had been unable to escape on his own.

“He looked just scared, like he was thinking he was going to die over there,” Parra said.

Parra smashed the window. A firefighter was close behind, and managed to get inside the man’s room and guide him over the windowsill. Together, they carried him down the ladder to safety.

It all happened so fast, and in the moment, Parra said he wasn’t worried about his own safety. He “just wanted to help people,” he said.

Travis Andersen and Jonathan Saltzman of the Globe staff contributed to this report.