PLYMOUTH – For many small towns in Chenango County, one structure fire a year is just about the norm. Plymouth has had a half-dozen. Is it a string of coincidences or arson?

While at first officials said there was no cause for alarm, the Chenango County Sheriff’s Office has now opened an investigation into at least one suspicious fire in the Town of Plymouth.

The investigation is in relation to a small fire that started in a home in Plymouth Monday night. Within the last week, there have been two structure losses as a result of fires on the Rt. 21 in the hamlet.

Before Monday night’s criminal investigation began, fire investigators had reaffirmed in both newspaper and television interviews that there was no cause for alarm and refuted the notion of an arsonist being on the loose in the town.

Now, sources from both the Plymouth Fire Department and County Fire Coordinator Matt Beckwith say they could no longer comment on these events because of the ongoing police investigation.

“Every fire is treated as a suspicious fire until found to be otherwise,” said Beckwith.

Plymouth Fire Chief Matt Bates told local media sources Monday that, “there’s a lot of rumors going around town that we have an arsonist on the loose. None of these fires were the result of arson.”

It’s easy to see why residents in the hamlet of Plymouth along Rt. 21 are a bit uneasy these days – three recent fires have left blackened, burned-out buildings within a stone’s throw of each other.