Shelter Island House Burns During Blizzard; Community Comes Together to Help Family

As a Shelter Island family struggles to recover from a fierce house fire Saturday during the blizzard, the community has come together to help.

A GoFundMe page has been up to help Bix and Lynn Kay Winters. who “suffered extensive damage to their house” as a result of the fire, the page states. “We would like to raise funds to support them until they can get back on their feet in their house.”

To date, the page has raised $8,800 in three days.

According to Shelter Island Police, the Shelter Island Fire Department and police responded to the call for a working residential structure fire at a local residence, which came in at 1:45 p.m. on Saturday as the snow was falling.

The three occupants of the home escaped safely, police said.

The fire was brought under control and extinguished by the Shelter Island Fire Department, as well as Greenport and Sag Harbor Fire Departments, police said. Shelter Island EMS also responded to the scene.

Upon investigation, Shelter Island Police said they identified “an emergency gasoline powered generator, being operated by the homeowner outside near the home, as the point of origin of the fire.”

The case was classified as non-criminal and closed, police said.

Southold Town Police Chief Martin Flatley said that a Shelter Island home was “fully engulfed”.