SPARKS, Nev. (AP) - Authorities are looking for two vehicles caught on surveillance video leaving the scene of an early morning fire that destroyed a vacant clubhouse Wednesday at a former golf course on the hills overlooking Sparks, one of the city’s biggest structure fires in 20 years.
Video from a camera at a neighboring home also shows six people in the area shortly before the fire was reported at 2:24 a.m. Wednesday at the former D’Andrea Golf Club surrounded by a housing subdivision, fire officials said.
The cause of the fire was under investigation. But Sparks Fire Marshal Robert King said they were treating it as suspicious and believe it most likely was caused by people.
Property managers who intended to turn the 15,000-square-foot clubhouse into a winery and events center said it had been the target of recent vandalism. A neighbor reported seeing six people climbing on the roof on Saturday, authorities said.
Smoke was billowing from the building when about two dozen Sparks firefighters arrived, and it soon was engulfed in flames, King told the Reno Gazette-Journal. The fire quickly broke through the ceiling, which eventually collapsed, he said.
King said it was one of the largest structure fires he had seen in his 21 years with the department. Firefighters didn’t find anyone inside the building, and no one was hurt, he said.
There was no immediate estimate of cost of the damage, but King said the building was a total loss
Investigators were trying to learn more about a white four-door pickup truck and brown sedan seen in the area, as well as the six people believed to be teenagers - four males and two females.
The clubhouse opened in 2000 with sweeping views of Reno’s skyline and the Sierra to the west. The clubhouse and 18-hole golf course had been closed since 2012.
The owners, IPC D’Andrea LLC, paid more than $400,000 in back taxes owed to Washoe County in April a week before the property was scheduled to be put up for auction to cover the bills.
Randi Thompson and Steve Trollope, managers of the winery project, said in a statement Wednesday that the owners recently replaced wood panels covering the doors and windows to prevent break-ins and vandalism, and they had repaired a large hole in an exterior wall where vandals earlier gained entrance.
“We are devastated and frustrated over the destruction of the clubhouse at D’Andrea,” they said. “We and the current property owners have spent considerable efforts and (money) over the past several months to clean up the property and repair the considerable damage done by vandals in anticipation of re-opening the clubhouse in the coming year.”
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