YORBA LINDA : Fire Burns Building and 56 Golf Carts

A fire sparked by an electrical problem raced through a cavernous storage facility at the Yorba Linda Country Club Monday night, destroying the building and 56 golf carts before firefighters were able to put out the blaze.

“It was one heck of a fire,” Orange County Fire Capt. Dan Young said of the two-alarm blaze. “It literally melted everything in its path.”

Young said that at 9:25 p.m., the 911 switchboard for the Fire Department lit up, as residents who lived as far away as 6 miles from the golf course called to report the blaze in the 19000 block of Mountain View Avenue.

“It lit up the sky,” Young said, “and generated tremendous heat.”

When firefighters arrived, the storage building, where golf carts were being recharged, was fully engulfed in flames, Young said. It took firefighters about 15 minutes to put out the flames, but crews were at the scene as late as Tuesday afternoon, mopping up.

“There’s nothing left but bumpers and rims,” Young said of the destroyed fiberglass golf carts. “That’s all you can see.”

Fire officials, concerned about leaking battery acid and exposed, charred lead, requested the assistance of Orange County Environmental Management Agency and Health Care Agency officials, Young said.

Young said investigators initially suspected that the fire was deliberately set. But an arson dog, borrowed from the Fullerton Fire Department, failed to find any evidence of arson. An electrician familiar with the building eventually concluded that faulty wiring was to blame, officials said.

Damage was estimated at $250,000, Young said.