Six displaced after fire rips through two East Bay homes

OAKLEY — Six people in two families were displaced after two homes burned Monday night, a fire official said.

Both houses in the 600 block of Country Lane will be able to be salvaged, but they both were heavily damaged in the blaze, Battalion Chief Jake Gonzalez of the East Contra Costa County Fire Protection District said.

Four people lived in one of the homes and two in the other, he said. They were all out of the homes when crews arrived.

Fire crews were called to the residences just before 4:30 p.m. and saw fire burning in both of the two-story houses. Firefighters were able to get inside the residences to douse the fires and keep them from spreading to other homes, he said.

Investigators believe the blaze began somewhere outside one of the homes and spread to both of them. They have not determined what caused it to start.

The homes were red-tagged, but eventually, the families should be able to move back in, Gonzales said. There is no timetable for when the houses may be safe to inhabit again.

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