A fire sparked by cigarette butts charred a large, 104-year-old Bend home Tuesday morning.

One of the eight tenants at 1933 NW Hill St. thought he smelled smoke around 11:30 p.m. Monday before heading to bed, but he dismissed it as drift smoke from a wildfire, Cindy Kettering, deputy fire marshal for Bend Fire & Rescue, said in a news release.

Discarded cigarettes in a combustible container smoldered on the home’s front deck overnight. Fire consumed the deck, traveled up the 2,300 square-foot house’s siding and into the attic, Kettering said. 

One of the tenants  woke to the smell of smoke the next morning, alerting the other seven, who all escaped safely.

“This could have been a far different outcome had one of the tenants not awakened to the smell of smoke,” Kettering said.

Around 5:22 a.m. Tuesday, multiple people called 911 reporting the fire, which was northwest of the Bend Parkway near the Revere Avenue exit.

It was “a fire that was both challenging and stubborn to extinguish,” Kettering said. 

The home did have smoke alarms, but they didn’t appear operable, she said. 

The house was built in 1920, and it formerly operated as a care home with multiple bedrooms. Kettering estimated damages totaled $600,000, which included $400,000 in damages to the outside, and $200,000 to its contents.

Kettering said smoke alarms double a person’s chance of surviving a fire. Bend fire has community programs to ensure every home has a working smoke alarm.