New details emerge in marathon inferno at Maggie Valley motel.
New details have emerged in a fire that caused devastating damage in Maggie Valley over the weekend.
Just before 2 p.m., Maggie Valley Fire and Rescue was called to the Heart of the Valley Motel, one of Maggie’s original motels dating to the 1950s.
After seven hours, they believed they had extinguished the fire, but in the early morning hours on Sunday, the fire reignited.
Firefighters faced a significant challenge in fighting the fire due to the building’s modular design, explained Maggie Fire Capt. Jared Shuler.
Each room was constructed as a unit, then stacked and bolted together. There was about a gap of about 12 to 18 inches between the walls and floors of each room, Shuler said.
Those air gaps provided oxygen to the fire and served as a route for flames to penetrate the structure, out of reach from firefighters’ water hoses.
“The way that the building was constructed, there were so many void spaces that acted like a chimney and let the fire go through it,” Shuler said.
Shuler speculated that embers may have gotten into one of those voids and sparked things up again.
“We were faced with fighting a larger fire at that point,” Shuler said.
The fire burned throughout the first and second floor of the motel during both blazes. All of the hotel rooms were destroyed, but a small residential portion off to the side of the hotel was saved.
The Heart of the Valley Motel is one of Maggie’s oldest, original motels — even predating the tourism kingpin of Ghost Town amusement park by two years. The motel was built in 1959 during the golden era of automobile tourism.
It was most recently operated by Burton and Caroline Edwards, who bought it three years ago and restored it. The motel is located behind the Stompin’ Grounds and near Miss Caroline’s Wedding Chapel — both of which were also operated by the Edwards family.
Smoke from the smoldering fire lasted well into the morning Sunday and could be seen throughout the valley. The cause of the fire is under investigation.
Junaluska Fire Department was among the neighboring departments that responded to the fire.
The cause of the fire is still under investigation by the North Carolina Office of the State Fire Marshal.
“They were called in to assist and they took over the investigation. We are supporting them,” Haywood County Fire Marshal Andrew Messer said.
Messer said the state fire marshal’s office will take lead on fires that are more complicated cases.
