LANCASTER TWP — A broken wire to outside lights was the suspected cause of a near fire Sunday morning at a large house on Vista Court in the township.

“It’s lucky someone was home,” said Chief Scott Garing of the Harmony Fire District. “It could have potentially been bad.”

Aaron Rectenwald and his wife were at their 2½-story house about 7:40 a.m. when they smelled smoke. They found the attached garage full of smoke and called 911.

“It came in as a working structure fire,” Garing said,

Along with the Harmony Fire District, volunteer firefighters from the Adams Area, Cranberry Township, Evans City and Connoquenessing were called to the home off Whitestown Road.

Crews detected the whiff of smoke in the house and a hot spot on the foundation but they could find no fire. It wasn’t until after an extensive inspection, including making a hole in the wall, that they uncovered the problem.

At the base of the garage, firefighters found a broken wire for sidewalk lights.

“The wire lit some mulch along the side of the house on fire,” Garing said, “and that caused the smoke to pour inside.

Authorities described the damage as minimal. But they noted that had the problem gone undetected, the house that contains several thousand square feet of living space could have caught fire.

Fire crews were back at their stations by 9:30 a.m.