An electrical fire in a John’s Island Golf Club maintenance building caused $1 million in damage to the structure and the expensive equipment stored inside.
Indian River Shores Public Safety officers were dispatched out on Dec. 1 in response to a fire alarm at 115 Silver Moss Drive, where a golf cart was left charging after the course closed for the evening, and caught fire. Also in the building that Thursday evening just before 7 p.m. were 20 commercial mowers used to manicure the greens. Black smoke billowed up from the building, due to rubber tires and fuel burning, as crews approached the golf maintenance complex.
Deputy Chief Mark Shaw said the building was fully engulfed when crews arrived, and the Shores called in help from Indian River County Fire-Rescue. The Orchid and Riverside Park stations both sent units to assist.
When firefighters tried to enter through the roll-up bay doors of the cart barn, they found the fire had burned so hot that the metal tracks of the doors had melted. County firefighters cut through the doors so crews could douse the blaze. They managed to save a portion of the structure from burning down, but the building had heavy smoke and water damage.
“The cart barn was right next to a building that had pallets of fertilizer in it, and the fire was about 100 yards north of the golf club. That was our goal to not let the fire spread to any other buildings,” Shaw said.
It took firefighters six minutes to arrive at the cart barn from the station, and another 44 minutes to extinguish the blaze.
John’s Island Property Owners Association General Manager Mike Korpar commended the firefighters at last week’s Shores Town Council meeting.
“The quick response kept a $1 million insurance claim from being a $5 million insurance claim,” Korpar said. “It could have gotten very bad.”
Photos provided by Indian River Shores Public Safety Department
