A spark in a nearby garbage can may have caused the fire that ravaged part of a Patterson home in the early afternoon Monday, Feb. 22, according fire officials.

The blaze began around 1 p.m. at a home on the 600 block of Berlin Way, burning the surrounding fence, easement and outside storage shed before it was contained quickly after, Patterson Fire Department Division Chief Jeff Gregory said.

No one was inside of the home at the time of the blaze.

“The fire was pretty much contained to the outside of the house, and we caught it pretty early,” he said. “From what we could tell, the fire looks like it started in the garbage can, and when it got hot enough that melted the nearby gas meter.”

Next-door neighbor Lisa Redfern said she was the one who called 9-1-1.

“I was just getting ready for work when my dogs started going crazy barking,” she said. “The next thing I know, all I could see was black smoke pluming from the house.”

Neighbor Clarin Weizenheimer said she noticed the fire when she heard a loud bang come from across the street.

“I heard something that sounded like a truck had crashed into the garage door — a huge boom,” she said. “When I came outside, the flames had leapt up as tall as the house.”

The house’s building requirements for a fire kept the blaze at bay and from destroying much of the inside of the house, Gregory said.

“The fire seems to have done some minor damage, but nothing that’s irreparable,” he said.