One firefighter suffered a minor shoulder injury early on and was taken to Greenwich Hospital, according to police Lt. James Heavey.
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No one was in the house at 1076 E. Putnam Ave. when the fire erupted. Dozens of fire trucks crowded around the front of the building and in the parking lot behind it, shutting the road down at Riverside Avenue. Ambulances were standing by, and police and Cos Cob Fire Police directed traffic through parking lots to get around the scene.
The fire appeared to be dying out after 10 or 15 minutes, but at 9:25 heavy fire again broke out from the roof and the firefighters were ordered to evacuate.
Air horns on the fire trucks and a radio tone were sounded, and the firefighters poured out of the building. After that, they worked mostly from the outside until the flames inside the building settled.
An hour and a half later the attic was still on fire, and plumes of smoke billowed into the dark sky above the house. Firefighters perched at the ends of truck-mounted ladders crept onto the roof and began to cut it open with circular saws.
The house's owner, a young woman, stood across the street watching her property burn, tears in her eyes. She said she was too upset to be interviewed.
Neighbors said she had been planning to open a tea room in the first floor of the house, and that signs to that effect had been displayed for more than a year. The maroon awning on the front of the building read "Tea Room on the Riverside" and a sign in the window read "open soon."
The fire was so tenacious that crews had to be rotated to let the firefighters take short rests. To make matters worse, a small fire in a building at 348 Greenwich Ave. broke out, and a crew had to leave the first fire to go to the second. A sprinkler system in the building put the Greenwich Avenue fire out, and the fire crew returned to East Putnam Avenue.
By 11:30 last night, the fire was under control, but firefighters were still working on the building, according to the fire dispatcher on duty.
