PORT HUENEME : Strand Garage Fire Stirs Fears of Arson

Investigators would not call it arson, but a garage fire Friday similar to a spate of deliberately set fires last fall in the Silver Strand area near Port Hueneme has some residents worried.

The latest blaze originated inside a garage at a duplex in the 100 block of Glendale Avenue just after 3 a.m. Friday and caused $20,000 in structural damage and $15,000 in property damage, including damage to two vehicles, a Ventura County Fire Department spokeswoman said.

No one was injured in the fire, which took 37 firefighters 15 minutes to knock down, officials said.

Seventeen fires were started in the same area during the last three months of 1992, most of which originated in garages or nearby trash cans, investigators said. Most were within a six-block area of the neighborhood known as the Strand.

At that time, investigators from the Ventura County sheriff’s and fire departments released a composite sketch of a suspect, and residents banded together to patrol the streets in the early-morning hours.

But the fires stopped and no arrest was made.