Fire Guts Bridgehampton House; Four Left Homeless

A family that survived the Rwandan genocide of 1994 and escaped civil war in the Ivory Coast a decade later, before finally finding a permanent home in Bridgehampton in 2005, lost everything they owned when a fast-moving fire gutted their home on Saturday night.

“We just felt exhausted,” said Thierry Balihuta, 35, who lived in the home with his mother, father and younger brother, and stood outside and watched as it burned. “So many times we’d been down to just the clothes we were wearing. My mother felt that once we moved here and got a house that it was over — but now this.”

Balihuta’s mother, Agnes Mujawayezu, 62, said she came home on Saturday from Stony Brook Southampton Hospital, where she works in the environmental department, and could smell smoke. She began a room-by-room search.

When she opened the door to the room of her former husband, Faustin Nsabumukunzi, 62, who still lives in the home but was out of town, flames erupted, and the room’s windows shattered.

Mujawayezu said she grabbed her coat and purse and ran out the front door and called her two sons.

Balihuta, the operations manager of the Sag Harbor Cinema, had left the home a short time before, bound for Sag Harbor. He called 911 and returned home. He said by the time he got there, firefighters were arriving at the scene, but flames were leaping from the front door and windows.

His brother, Didier Irabizi, 31, who runs the shipping department for the home goods store Monc XIII in Sag Harbor, had just walked into a party in East Hampton when he received his mother’s frantic call. He, too, called 911, and then hailed an Uber ride home. The 10-minute wait was an eternity, he said.

Irabizi stood in the driveway, watching firefighters work, repeating, “No, no, no.”

Bridgehampton Fire Chief Nick Hemby said the initial alarm came in at 9:43 p.m., and firefighters from the Bridgehampton, Sag Harbor and Southampton fire departments answered the call. Despite what Hemby described as a “really good response,” the house, at 668 Bridgehampton-Sag Harbor Turnpike, was totally engulfed in flames by the time they arrived.

Hemby said between 70 and 80 volunteers, which included ambulance teams from Bridgehampton, Sag Harbor and East Hampton, were at the scene until about 1 a.m. Sunday. Southampton Town Police and the Southampton Town fire marshals also were at the scene.

Balihuta said the family wanted to thank firefighters and other volunteers for their rapid response. Ironically, Balihuta will be joining the Bridgehampton Fire Department next month. “I wish I had done it sooner,” he said.

The fire marshal’s office has yet to issue a statement about the fire, other than to say it remains under investigation.

Balihuta said it was strange that his mother did not hear a smoke alarm, because the house was wired with them. “If you burned something in the microwave, they would go off,” he said.

The house, which had been constructed for the family by Habitat for Humanity, had three first-floor bedrooms and an unfinished second-floor loft.

The family had plans to finish the second floor next year, and Balihuta said he had taken a working vacation beginning Saturday so he could repair the deck and do some painting. Instead, on Monday, he found himself talking to an insurance adjuster and looking after his mother, who fell ill after spending hours in the cold Saturday night.

The house, he said, was a total loss from top to bottom. The only possessions that were not burned, he said, were those that were stored in the basement, and they were waterlogged and covered in ash and muddy drywall.

Balihuta said he had yet to contact his father, who runs a landscaping business and often travels to Africa in the winter months.

The three family members stayed with friends in Bridgehampton on Saturday night before receiving emergency housing at the Southampton Inn through the American Red Cross.

Local relief efforts are already beginning to take shape.

A co-worker at Stony Brook Southampton Hospital, Julianna Bennett, has launched a gofundme campaign for Mujawayezu. It can be found at gofund.me/e967b692 or by going to gofundme.com and searching, “Agnes Mujawayezu after House Fire.”

A second gofundme campaign, for Balihuta and Irabizi, has been organized by their friend, Olivia Kotz. It can be found at gofund.me/ade32c8f or by going to gofundme.com and searching, “Please Help Thierry, Didier and Family Recover.”

Due to a generous response from the community, the family has already received more than enough clothing and, in fact, has no place to store additional donations. Gift cards for things like food purchases are welcome and can be delivered to the Sag Harbor Cinema.