CANTON – A trailer fire touched off a bizarre emotional scene Thursday when the resident entered the structure and came out with a gun.

The late-morning fire swept through the trailer’s attached porch causing an estimated $20,000 in damage, said Canton Assistant Fire Chief Mark Blanchette.

No one was injured in the blaze at the Lot 9 home of David Noyes Jr. in the Canton Point Road Trailer Park, but tension was heightened when Noyes entered the trailer.

About 2 p.m., and after a Canton firefighter cordoned off the home with police tape, Noyes, who drove to the scene on a four-wheel all-terrain vehicle, ducked under the tape and entered the trailer.

Firefighters quickly moved toward the charred doorway, yelling at him to get out, which he did, carrying an undamaged rifle.

Noyes then angrily cocked the gun, while holding it upright, yelling back at firefighters and Maine Forest Ranger Jay Bernard who was at the scene.

He continued striding across the yard to the ATV – without pointing the gun at anyone – got on the four-wheeler and roared off, running over a fire hose, while shouting obscenities.

“The emotional impact of having his house go up in flames may have provoked him,” Bernard said later Thursday.

Soon after the incident, Bernard, who was unarmed, called for backup from the Oxford County Sheriff’s Office.

Once Noyes calmed down, he returned to help investigators, Bernard added.

The uninsured trailer, which is owned by Josh Noyes, is located about five miles south of the Route 2 and Canton Point Road intersection.

Blanchette said that when he arrived, the light blue, single-wide trailer’s attached porch was ablaze, as was also one side of a nearby pine tree and the front lawn.

“Fire on the whole side was really cranking,” Blanchette said.

Witnesses said smoke was coming out of the windows, which were blackened from interior smoke. A smoke detector was sounding.

About 30 firefighters from Canton Volunteer Fire and Rescue, Peru Fire and the Dixfield Fire Co., responded, along with a Med-Care Ambulance crew, following an 11:55 a.m. call to Oxford County 9-1-1 dispatchers in Paris.

The fire was quickly knocked down, leaving the trailer interior with heavy smoke damage and the porch with heavy fire damage, Blanchette said.

At first, firefighters believed the fire may have started in a cinder block fire ring opposite a small, fenced-in dog yard. Grass around the ring and trailer yard was scorched.

The fire burned through wood and insulation on the porch, melted siding, and got into the tree from the roof.

On the ground, the blaze was stopped short of spreading to an adjacent trailer.

Because firefighters suspected the fire ring for the cause, Bernard was summoned to investigate.

Bernard, however, determined that the blaze was a backing fire, originating around the porch, and backing out toward the fire ring and beyond, being blown by the wind.

And because he believed the fire originated at the structure, Bernard turned the investigation over to the State Fire Marshal’s Office. An investigator arrived later in the afternoon, but has yet to make a decision.

“The exact determination is going to be a process of elimination, and I have eliminated the fire ring,” Bernard said.

Several people milled about standing in groups, away from the scene and in the yard, watching firefighters work. Some bystanders were crying, hugging friends.

Canton firefighters called in the Red Cross to assist Noyes and his family, who were believed to be staying with relatives Thursday night.

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