Tarpon house fire blamed on hair dryer

TARPON SPRINGS -- A fire that started with a dome-shaped hair dryer Tuesday morning displaced a woman and her two children.

The fire at 132 E Lime St. started shortly after 7 a.m. in the kitchen, where a hair dryer was plugged in but not turned on, said Capt. Don Sayre of Tarpon Springs Fire Rescue, which extinguished the blaze. The exact cause of the fire wasn't immediately clear, but it could have been a wiring malfunction in the hair dryer, he said.

The fire caused about $40,000 in damage to the one-story house, he said.

Nobody was home at the time. Clarissa Winthrop, 27, who rents the house, had gone to work as a certified nursing assistant at the Palm Garden nursing home in Clearwater. Her 8-year-old daughter and 2-year-old son were at school, she said.

Winthrop used the hair dryer when she styled relatives' hair. It had a helmet-shaped dryer that dropped down over a person's head.

"I didn't know what I was going to come home to," Winthrop said as she toured her charred kitchen Tuesday morning. "I don't even want to be in here."

The Red Cross was at the house Tuesday and planned to provide a place for Winthrop and her children to stay for a few days.

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