Fire guts recently rehabbed Bensenville house
The owner of a recently renovated house on the 400 block of East Jefferson Street in Bensenville was supposed to move into the home Wednesday, but that will have to wait after a fire gutted the basement of the structure and caused significant smoke damage throughout.
No one was injured in the blaze, which was reported just before 8 a.m. Tuesday and is being blamed on an electrical malfunction.
Bensenville Fire Protection District Chief Michael Spain estimated the damage to be more than $100,000.
Spain said workers showed up to put the finishing touches on the interior of the two-story house but were greeted with a massive cloud of smoke when they opened the door.
Firefighters quickly extinguished the blaze and then began salvage operations. Investigators believe the blaze in the basement was raging for several hours because fire damage to basement rafters left them about "20% to 30%" of their original size, Spain said.
The fire is being blamed on a paint gun that was still plugged into an outlet that overheated. Spain said the overheating equipment should have tripped a circuit breaker, but it did not.