Electrical fire renders Cary home uninhabitable

Cary Fire Protection District officials are still investigating what caused a Wednesday evening electrical fire at a house on the 900 block of Crabtree Lane.

Firefighters were dispatched to the home twice Wednesday, fire officials said.

The first call came in just after 7:40 p.m., when homeowners were concerned about a smell of smoke. Firefighters located a the source of the odor to be coming from the home's electrical panel.

"Small amounts of light smoke were seen slowly puffing out of the top of the panel box," Lt. Michael Douglass said in a news release.

Firefighters checked the interior and exterior walls using thermal imaging and spotted no heat signatures.

ComEd was contacted to shut off power to the home, which was done remotely via a "smart meter," fire officials said.

Because power was shut off, the residents of the home went to a neighbor's home to spend the night.

Just before 10:30 p.m., firefighters were dispatched back to the home and discovered the outside smart meter "burning," according to the release.

The meter was extinguished, but firefighters soon discovered the fire had extended inside. It took about 20 minutes to extinguish the blaze inside the two-story home, fire officials said.

No damage estimate was available, but fire officials said the house suffered smoke and water damage throughout.