By Kyle Magin – North Lake Tahoe Bonanza

A fire that started Friday on a 500-block Lakeshore Boulevard home was contained quickly by an in-home sprinkler system that North Lake Tahoe Fire Protection District officials say saved the home.

The fire started in a walk-in closet in the master bedroom of the home a little before 12:30 p.m. Friday, said NLTFPD Asst. Fire Marshal Pete Mulvihill.

Once a fire detector was activated by smoke in the room, two sprinkler heads douses the flames before firefighters from the NLTFPD arrived to contain what was left of the blaze. The home’s caretaker was on the property but no one was inside the home while the fire was burning and no one was hurt.

Mulvihill said an official cause of the fire has not been determined but expects one early next week.

“This is a great advertisement for fire sprinkler systems,” said Gary Walsh, who bought the home in 2000.

Walsh said the home was equipped with a sprinkler system when he bought it and then updated it after the purchase.

“The sprinkler system operated very successfully,” Mulvihill, who was among more than one dozen NLTFPD firefighters on the scene, said. “One sprinkler head in the closet and a second one outside the closet door worked to contain the fire with far less water than we would have used with a fire hose.”

Both Walsh and the home’s caretaker, Alex Estevez, suspected the blaze started from an electrical failure in the walk-in closet.

Estevez said he first noticed the fire at 12:28 p.m. Friday and alerted Walsh via cell phone.

Walsh, who says he and his wife split their time between the home and a ranch in Gardnerville, Nev., is selling the home through Lakeshore Realty.

The home and two others which sit on the property is listed for $47 million altogether, making it one of the three most expensive properties on Lake Tahoe and top-25 nationwide.

Chris Plastiras, who along with wife Patti are the listing agents for the home, said Friday’s damage was minimal and credited the NLTFPD with a good job to save the home.

“The fire district did a phenomenal job of responding to this,” Plastiras said. “There was some water damage, I think a little less than 1,000 gallons of water were used in total, but we should be able to restore it in a relatively short period of time.”

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