Onlookers warn man refilling propane tanks before gazebo catches fire, Oregon cops say
_fitted.png "Onlookers warned a man refilling portable propane tanks before he set a park gazebo ablaze, witnesses said, according to Oregon police.")
Onlookers warned a man refilling portable propane tanks before he set a park gazebo ablaze, witnesses said, according to Oregon police.
The man was refilling portable propane tanks with a larger one in front of an open flame propane heater at Don and Ann Davis Memorial Park in Newport on Monday, Dec. 12, the Newport Police Department said in a Dec. 13 Facebook post.
Onlookers alerted the man that the “inside of the gazebo smelled like propane and that he needed to stop because it was not safe,” police said.
He then “dropped an open propane bottle directly in front of the open flame, which ignited the open bottle,” before fleeing, police said.
Newport police and the Newport Fire Department were sent to the area shortly after 5 p.m., police said. When they arrived, they found the fire inside the gazebo “with flames about eight feet high.”
Police said the fire department quickly put out the blaze, while police interviewed witnesses.
The man, who was found hiding at a nearby park, admitted to “refilling the propane bottles but denied causing the fire,” police said.
He was taken into custody and booked into jail on charges of reckless burning, criminal mischief and reckless endangering, according to police.
Newport is about 80 miles southwest of Salem.
