DIXFIELD — For the second time in a little over a year, Shawn Roberts has lost a home in a fire, Dixfield Fire Chief Scott Dennett said Monday.

Shawn and his wife, Bathilde, and their three children escaped their 2½-story wood-framed house at 23 Rowe St. unharmed late Saturday night, the chief said. They had no insurance on the property, he said

The fire was reported at about 11 p.m. and started on the first floor in the back of the house, Dennett said.

“It appears to be related to a wood stove breaching in the chimney,” he said. “The damage was so much that we had to do quite a bit of destruction to that portion of the building. Shawn Roberts said he could see fire between a false wall and the chimney itself.”

Firefighters from Dixfield, Peru and Mexico responded.

“On our initial arrival, there was a vehicle that was stuck midway up the very narrow, icy driveway, Dennett said. “It had to get pulled out before we could even respond in there. At that time, the building was filling with quite a bit of smoke.”

Firefighters could see some flames when they arrived, he said, “But a lot of it was in hidden void spaces, like many older homes have, which made it difficult to fight. Then it became a bit of a situation with a lack of necessary manpower to be able to continue any kind of interior attack.”

Dennett said the house is a total loss.

“There was one room that wasn’t touched too much by fire,” he said. “The main structure is still standing, but it’s pretty much a burnt-out shell.” 

One firefighter was taken to Rumford Hospital with shortness of breath and later released, he said.

According to a GoFundMe page (https://www.gofundme.com/bathildeshawn-roberts-house-fire), the family lost everything.

Dennett said Shawn Roberts told him it was the second time he’d been burned out of a home. In November 2015, Roberts was living with his parents at their home on Route 232 in Rumford when it burned, Dennett said. No one was injured, according to a newspaper report.

bfarrin@sunmediagroup.net