Summers' Home Suffers Fire

What started as a small microwave fire near University President Lawrence H. Summers’ residence earlier this month caused more than $25,000 worth of damages.

While Summers was in New York on Nov. 5, a “faulty microwave” in the kitchen of his house manager’s residence—about 50 feet from his own house at 33 Elmwood Ave.—ignited a costly blaze, he said in an interview yesterday.

“I was told that the microwave sparked and it caught something and lit it [on fire],” Summers said.

Though no one was hurt and Summers’ own residence was not damaged, he said the neighboring building requires extensive repairs.

“There was electrical damage,” Summers said. “And there was a fair amount of damage to the kitchen and damage to the furniture.”

The Cambridge Fire Department (CFD) responded to the alarm call at 6:47 p.m. on Nov. 5, according to CFD Chief Gerald Reardon.

Firefighters extinguished the blaze in under an hour, Reardon said.

“It was contained in the kitchen area,” he said, but added that repairs are costly because “there’s also water and salt damage.”

Reardon also said that the fire appeared to have been electrical in nature, but the exact cause is still under investigation.

In addition to firefighters and Harvard University Police Department (HUPD) officers, officials from University Operations Services, Harvard Real Estate and Environmental Health and Safety handled the blaze and its aftermath.

All officials had cleared out by 10 p.m., about three hours after CFD first arrived.

HUPD spokesperson Steven G. Catalano said the response was “standard operating procedure” for a fire of this nature.

—Staff writer Hana R. Alberts can be reached at alberts@fas.harvard.edu.