Are they connected? Investigating dumpster fires

After a rash of 11 dumpster fires break out in one neighborhood in less than a month, fire investigators are trying to find a suspect and stop a dangerous trend.

The 11 dumpster fires all broke out within a block of the intersection of Nicholasville Road and Malabu Drive, the department said.

“To have that many in that narrow of a geographical area in that time frame is unusual,” says Lexington Fire Department Battalion Chief Mark Blankenship.

That first fire happened on January 10th, Blankenship says.

"Routinely we don’t go out on dumpsters because they can occur accidently,” says Blankenship. “But when we noticed the trend that there was an increase number in them, it gathered our attention."

The growing trend has some concern among neighbors and firefighters.

“There is an untold number of toxic chemicals that are released as smoke in a dumpster fire”, says Blankenship. “[It is] probably one of the worst fires you could fight.”

And there’s a cost as well, he says. It is about a $1,000 just to fix the dumpster after each fire.

According to Blankenship, these fires haven’t caught anything else on fire, but it is a possibility.

“It could easily set the fence on fire that’s around it,” he says.

The fire department says the best way to catch an arsonist is getting them in the act.

“Our biggest concern with these dumpsters is they are going to escalate in severity to what they are doing,” he says.

Anyone with information regarding the dumpster fires is asked to call the Lexington Fire Department at 859-231-5600.