Questions About Fatal Noyac Fire Linger As Victims Are Mourned

The investigation into the August 3 fire that claimed the lives of two sisters from Maryland whose family was renting a house in Noyac will likely take another week or more to conclude, Southampton Town officials said, as questions about the safety features in the home have swirled.

Contrary to some accounts, Southampton Town Emergency Management Coordinator Ryan Murphy said there were, in fact, smoke detectors in the house. Anecdotal evidence from firefighters, however, have called into question whether the alarms had functioned properly when the fire broke out.

The sisters, Jillian Wiener, 21, and Lindsay Wiener, 19, were buried on Monday in Potomac, Maryland, where the family resides.

Lindsay Wiener was to be a sophomore at Tulane University this fall, where she studied marketing and Jewish studies; her sister was a senior and aspiring environmentalist at the University of Michigan, according to an obituary of the two girls released by Sagel Bloomfield Danzansky Goldberg Funeral Care.

A friend who answered the phone at the family’s home in Potomac said that the Wieners were in mourning and not ready to discuss the tragedy yet.

Both girls had attended the Holton-Arms School for Girls in Bethesda, Maryland. Head of School Susanna Jones offered a remembrance of the girls’ passions in a letter to the school community on August 4.

“Jillian was a soccer and ice hockey player, as well as an artist, and her passions were yoga and community service. A certified yoga instructor, Jillian taught yoga classes to younger students during her senior project. Jillian also devoted hours of her time to raising awareness and funds for families whose children have cancer,” she wrote.

“Lindsay was a bright spirit and a leader, who was also dedicated to service, particularly getting young people involved in politics and generally promoting volunteerism. As president of the Community Service Club during COVID, she found creative ways to encourage student engagement in service. As president of the Jewish Culture Club, she also did much to educate the community about Jewish religious traditions.”

The sisters’ father, Lewis, is the president of the Washington Hebrew Congregation, a prominent Jewish house of worship in the Washington, D.C., region. The organization mourned the tragedy last week.

“The world has lost two beautiful lights today, and we are heartbroken,” the organization said in a statement on its website. “Through their leadership and service, acts of kindness, and friendship, the Wiener family has touched so many lives at Washington Hebrew.

“Just two months ago, we came together as a community to celebrate with the Wieners when Lew was installed as our congregation’s president,” the statement continued. “Now, as a community, we will again come together to support and lift up Lew, Alisa and Zach in every way possible.”

All five members of the family were in the Spring Lane home when the fire broke out, sometime before 3:30 a.m. on August 3. The Wiener girls and their brother, Zachary, were sleeping in second-floor bedrooms, their parents on the first floor.

Zachary, 23, was able to leap to safety out of a window. Lewis Wiener told Southampton Town Police at the scene that he was awakened by the sound of breaking glass — his son escaping from the second floor — and that he and his wife, Alisa, were able to get out safely. Once outside, and realizing his daughters were still inside, he tried to return into the house but was pushed back by the flames, he told police.

Sag Harbor Fire Department Chief Kevin O’Brien Jr. said that when he arrived at the scene, the rear of the house was ablaze, but that when firefighters tried to enter through the front door, they were repelled by the searing heat.

While the fire was primarily on the first floor, the vaulted ceilings and balconied second floor of the saltbox-style home was where the most intense heat and smoke had concentrated, O’Brien said.

While water was poured onto the flames, firefighters used a ladder to reach the second floor through a window to the room where the girls were found unconscious. The firefighters’ attack on the flames quickly quelled the inferno, and rescuers were able to carry the girls down the stairs through the interior of the house and began performing CPR on them once outside.

They were rushed to Stony Brook Southampton Hospital but pronounced dead shortly after arriving there.

O’Brien said that the scene was a traumatizing one for the firefighters.

“It was one of the most emotional fires we’ve had in a very long time,” the chief said. “We deal with death a lot, but this one hurt everybody.”

A Suffolk County crisis and stress management counseling team met with several of the firefighters who were at the scene and will be returning later this month.

Investigators have offered no indications of how the fire may have started, and Murphy said that he does not expect a report on the cause and other aspects of the investigation until about August 20.

“Fire investigations tend to take time,” he said. “The fire marshals do their investigation, then the insurance companies tend to do their own, and releasing information is done slowly, because you don’t want to taint other investigations.”

Murphy said the house does have a certificate of occupancy, but part of the investigation will look at whether it was updated to include all of the modifications made to the home over time, whether the smoke detectors were working and whether they were in the proper places as required by building and safety codes.

The house did not have a rental permit, he said, as required by Southampton Town for both seasonal and year-round rentals. The permit would have required a certified safety inspection to be conducted before the house was rented.

“Smoke detectors, carbon monoxide alarms, the relief valve on the hot water heater, pool gates, pool alarms, GFI outlets — that’s all why the permitting process exists,” he said. “It’s not just to get permit fees — there’s a service that goes with it. It’s all about safety.”

Photos of the aftermath show that a small section of the rear deck and what looks like a grilling area at the exterior of the house were badly burned, along with the rear structure of the house.

While Murphy confirmed that there were smoke detectors in the home, whether they functioned properly as the fire spread is unknown. Firefighters who were at the scene said that they did not hear smoke alarms going off when they arrived and entered the house.

“Normally, they are an aggravation, they get in the way of our communications and we have to make a point of completely destroying them to make them stop — but nobody heard them this time,” O’Brien said. “It’s possible that the heat could have destroyed them by the time we got there, but I don’t know, that’s doubtful.”

Murphy said that the placement and functionality of the smoke alarms will be part of the Southampton Town fire marshal’s investigation of the fire.

Pamela Miller, whose family owns the home, which the Wieners told police they were renting, said this week that she could not answer any questions about the incident.

She offered a written statement that she asked be published in its entirety. It reads:

“I would take a step back and smile at our home with new appreciation before handing it over. After wiping every baseboard trim down and polishing our dog’s nose prints off the glass panes it looked like it should be photographed. I recall a renter feeling bad when they noticed Marcus, my little man, waiting for me to ‘hand over the keys,’ because they felt like they were banishing him from his home. I told them that was nonsense. Because of them we could manage to keep him in school, where he was permitted to accelerate grades for his math studies. Because of them we stood a chance of remaining in the town I grew up in — ironically, across from the very first home we purchased when we got married — yet another year. I would always tell folks that good times had by other families added to the positive vibes that made our house the home we loved to return to.

“But the very walls surrounding each room which held years of playdate laughter cornered another family into peril. The very beds I tucked my own beloveds in to, the very ones I laid down beside them to comfort them to sleep, became deathtraps for another mother’s precious heartbeats.

“There was a house perched on a hill that twinkled holiday lights. The sight of it put cheer in folks as they drove by. Now it hovers over, invoking the worst fear in all. It is a reminder to all the brave emergency service workers of the burden of heartache in their job that no one should have to carry.

“Two families with dreams for their children and an entire town will never be the same. All because of what I knew as home. I am only managing to stand out of the love I have for my children as another mother mourns hers. What more can I say if I can’t alter those words. I can’t even extend condolences knowing I will only inflict more pain than comfort.

“I was asked to make a statement. I can only express my heart. Please hold your loved ones tight.”