Officials look for fire cause
Fire crews work together to put out the blaze, which took just under two hours to have under control.
Kalispell fire and police investigators on Tuesday continued looking into the cause of Saturday night’s fire at Famous Dave’s restaurant.
“We know at this time it appears to have started between the roof and the ceiling, and it appears to involve one of the heating components in the building,” Kalispell Police Det. Kevin McCarvel said on Tuesday.
That heating component, he confirmed, “appears to have been the ignition source.”
Meanwhile, restaurant owners hope to have Famous Dave’s reopened by this summer.
Kalispell firefighters were called to the restaurant on Friday, the day before the fire,
when an electric motor was found burning in the mechanical room.
Fire Chief Dan Diehl said the restaurant had several workers in and out of the building all day Saturday trying to fix the damaged machinery.
A Famous Dave’s kitchen employee had told the Daily Inter Lake on Saturday night the restaurant was having trouble with a water heater.
“We talked about it that night,” Diehl said on Monday. “We also have information from other people there at the restaurant. They noticed smoke at least 30 minutes before the staff asked them to leave. We were told that was normal.”
Diehl would not speculate on the source of the smoke. In a barbecue restaurant, the meat-smoking and cooking process would produce a certain level of smoke, he pointed out.
He said he asked Kalispell Police Sgt. Tim Falkner, a member of the county fire investigation team, to investigate the scene. McCarvel assisted Falkner and spoke on the department’s behalf, since Falkner is out of the office this week.
It was more than just the size of the fire that prompted Diehl’s request.
“We wanted them to document some things related to work in the mechanical room,” Diehl said. “Currently the police department is trained on doing fire investigation, when there’s a potential for a criminal act involved. But part of that investigation would include cause and determination.”
McCarvel said investigators also are looking into the functioning of the restaurant’s alarms.
“We do know there were some reports regarding the alarm systems and that type of thing that we are reviewing,” McCarvel said.
Restaurant owners expected their insurance company to send its own investigator no later than today and they are making plans to be back in business by summer.
“We’re hoping to hear an answer soon” from the insurance company, Casey Ryan of Missoula said.
Ryan, a part of the ownership group for Famous Dave’s restaurants in the area, stood outside the restaurant talking with two other men Monday afternoon as employees hauled bags and trash barrels of food out the back door. All of it, Ryan said, was going to the landfill.
Kalispell store manager Michael Schindler was inside working on the cleanup and was unavailable for comment.
Ryan said the sprinkler system kicked on after the fire began. Smoke and water damage spread throughout the restaurant, but fire damage was contained largely to the west end where the mechanical room, office and kitchen are located.
Firefighters from Kalispell, Whitefish and Evergreen used thermal imaging cameras inside the smoke-filled restaurant to locate the fire as it burned above the ceiling, while other firefighting crews battled flames on the roof.
On Monday, Ryan said 10 or 12 Famous Dave’s employees were at work tossing out the contaminated food. As cleanup continues, more people will be called in to work as needed.
The restaurant employed 70 people.
“That’s priority No. 1, employee retention,” he said. “We’ll do our best to keep as many of them with hours and on the clock.”
Reopening as soon as feasible is a high priority, too, he said.
“This is a good market for us. Now that everybody’s safe,” he said, the owners planned to focus on repairs and reopening.
The fire caused an estimated $250,000 in damage. Nobody was injured.
Reporter Nancy Kimball can be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at nkimball@dailyinterlake.com