NORTH HERO, Vt. (AP) — Vermont investigators believe a house fire that led to the death of two young brothers was accidental, caused by an issue with an electric clothes dryer and vent system, state police said Monday.
Police identified the victims as Theodore Maltais, 5, and 11-month-old Nathaniel Maltais. The boys’ parents escaped the fire early Saturday but couldn’t reach their sons, police said.
The dryer was in use about an hour before the fire, police said. The home had smoke detectors, which were sounding when first responders arrived.
Theodore was a kindergarten student at the small North Hero School, where grief counselors were available on Monday.
“The grief counselors have been clear with us throughout the whole process that the best thing we can do is to keep a common routine, keep the routine as common as we possibly can,” Superintendent Michael Clark said Monday. “And so counselors have been meeting with individual students as needed. And you know we’ve got teaching and learning going on today and a community supporting each other.”
The day before, about 50 parents and community members attended a meeting with counselors “to learn how to talk with children in developmentally appropriate ways about loss, death and grief,” he said.
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