LISBON

A boy was taken to a hospital with smoke inhalation after he and his brother escaped a fire at 3 Marc Drive in Lisbon Wednesday morning.

The structure fire was reported at 7:48 a.m. Lisbon Fire Chief Nate LeClair said when he arrived there was smoke coming from every window, with fire coming from the back of the trailer.

There were two children home at the time the fire broke out.

“One of the kids tried going back in to get the dog and thankfully the neighbors pulled the kid out before he got into any more trouble,” LeClair said.

As a result, the boy suffered some smoke inhalation. The dog came out of the house on its own.

The two boys live at the home with their grandmother, who Lisbon police say had left for work when the fire started. She came home and took the grandchild with smoke inhalation to the hospital to be checked out.

According to town assessing records, the home belongs to Louise Hamner.

Initially, lack of firefighters meant the first crew on the scene meant the fire could only be battled from the exterior. Additional firefighters responded from Lewiston, Durham and Topsham.

Another challenge came from the construction of the mobile home, which had a second roof built over the original roof. That gave the fire opportunity to travel between the two layers, and firefighters had to gain access to that before they could extinguish it.

LeClair estimated it took between 20-30 minutes before the fire was extinguished. Fortunately, the fire did not spread to the nearby neighboring homes.

Daryll Gagnon lives next door to the house that caught fire and said Hamner lives there with two grandsons, ages 11 and 13. One of the boys came to get him and told him there was a fire in the bedroom.

The oldest boy had tried to put the fire out by pouring water on it, Gagnon said.

He called 911 and began alerting others in the neighborhood of the fire. When he got outside to look, there were already flames showing and the fire was growing fast.

The fire spread in seconds, said Gagnon’s daughter, Teila Lavoie.

“I saw the flames going almost up to that tree right by my house, in back of it,” she said, “and I was getting a little scared at that time.”

Lavoie was displaced from a home in Lewiston a couple years ago, so Wednesday’s fire brought on an anxiety attack.

Gagnon said he and other residents were wondering what their neighbors will do next after losing their home and belongings, knowing that they’ll have to start over, but noting that it’s a close-knit community.

“Everybody looks out for one another,” he said.

LeClair said the home is a total loss. The American Red Cross will offer assistance to the family.

A state fire investigator responded to the scene, LeClair said, but the cause of the fire — believed to have started in the back bedroom— is still under investigation.

dmoore@timesrecord.com