LIVERMORE – Fire ripped through a garage on Route 4 Monday morning destroying it.

About 40 firefighters from Livermore, Livermore Falls and Jay were able to save an adjacent building that housed the office for N-Auto Sales & Service and a second-floor apartment. The two structures are next to Community Emergency Services ambulance station.

No one was injured, fire Chief Randy Berry said.

Bruce Hall of Chesterville hugged his friend and owner of the garage, Jason Ward of North Jay, who has owned the shop for eight years and was visibly upset as they watched flames consume the garage before firefighters could arrive.

It must have been the furnace, Ward said to Hall.

“It’s not your fault,” Hall told him.

Berry said there were three or four guys who lost tools in the fire. They managed to salvage a few wrenches, he said.

Hall, who also does some work at the garage, said he had gone outside to put a battery in a truck. Someone going by stopped and told Hall the building was on fire, he said.

Hall said a vehicle that was being worked on in the garage was pushed out.

He walked up and down the highway and directed traffic as he waited for fire trucks to arrive.

As firefighters started spraying water, heavy smoke blowing across the highway reduced visibility.

Berry said he was not sure what caused the fire.

Berry said the Fire Marshal’s Office had been called and an investigator was expected to arrive Tuesday.

The house was in good shape except for siding that melted and a couple of windows that cracked.

The garage was old and oil soaked, which fueled the fire, he said.

“I think the apartment is going to be fine,” Berry said.

The tenant who lived there is spending the night at a motel in Wilton.

Berry said the men dragged a welder and propane tank from the garage before firefighters arrived.

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