Fire destroys home of congressional candidate Darcy Burner

Eighth Congressional District candidate Darcy Burner's Eastside home went up in flames today.

The fire started between 7 and 7:30 a.m. on the 3600 block of West Ames Lake Drive Northeast near Redmond, fire authorities said.

The cause of the blaze was determined this afternoon to be accidental. It was attributed to a malfunctioning electrical device that was plugged into an outlet in a bedroom, said Sgt. John Urquhart of the King County Sheriff's Office.

Burner, 37, a Democrat, is running against Republican Rep. Dave Reichert.

At midmorning, Burner, wearing a gray T-shirt, looked at the smoldering remains of her house on the Ames Lake waterfront.

Her 5-year-old son, Henry, came into her and her husband's bedroom around 7 a.m. screaming there was a fire in his room, Burner said.

"I scooped him up and got him out of the house," she said. Everyone, including the family's golden retriever Bruce Wayne, made it out uninjured, but their cat did not survive.

Sandeep Kaushik, Burner's spokesman, said the house is "seriously damaged." No plans have been made as to where they're going to stay

"They're just figuring it all out," he said.

Burner said the house was originally a cabin on the lake dating to about the 1950s and had been remodeled several times. Her family had lived there since 2002.

Mona Merritt, who lives across the lake from Burner's house, was the first to call 911. She was startled by a woman's screams as she was sipping her morning coffee.

"I heard, 'Get out of the house!' or 'Get out of my house!' Merritt said.

Voices travel over water, and even though all the words weren't clear, she knew someone was in trouble, she said.

So Merritt grabbed the phone. Within seconds, "I could tell the house was on fire," she said. "It was horrible. It just went up so fast."

From her house, Merritt could see that the upstairs was destroyed, she said, but the rest of the house was standing. The stench of fire and fumes still hangs in the air, she said.

Burner is making her second run for Congress. She lost to Reichert in 2006 by three percentage points.

Burner said she hadn't yet considered whether the fire would impact her campaign.

"I am today focused on my family and just really grateful that my family is OK," she said. "Tomorrow I'll wake up and figure out what comes next."

Before running for office, Burner was a middle manager at Microsoft. Her husband, Mike Burner, is taking care of their son full-time while Burner campaigns. He previously also worked for Microsoft.

Burner and her husband bought the 2,250-square-foot, 3-bedroom house for $550,000, according to county property records. In a recent interview, she described it as "teeny" compared to the other homes in the neighborhood.

Sonia Krishnan: 206-515-5546 or skrishnan@seattletimes.com. Staff reporter Emily Heffter contributed to this story.