Stan Lane went to Ames True Value in Wiscasset to pick up some things after he and wife Norma Dreyfus lost their Westport Island home in a massive fire last week.

He said someone asked him why he didn’t go to WalMart.

The people at WalMart didn’t fight the fire at his home, Lane said. Some of the firefighters on departments that responded to the Feb. 25 fire work at Ames.

Westport Island, Wiscasset, Edgecomb, Boothbay, Alna, Dresden, Woolwich and Newcastle fire departments and Wiscasset Ambulance Service all sent crews to the mid-afternoon Thursday fire that Westport Fire Chief Bob Mooney suspects began overnight.

The State Fire Marshal’s Office was still investigating, but there was nothing suspicious, Mooney said. The smart money is on a lightning strike, he said Friday.

Storms hit the region overnight Feb. 24 into Feb. 25. Most passed to the north. “But a few came right over us,” said Mooney, who lives nearby.

Drefus and Lane said they had an alarm system for security, smoke and fire; Lincoln County Communications got no report of an alarm from the North End Road home, Mooney said. So either a direct lightning strike or one nearby may have taken out the home’s electrical system and started a fire in a wall or walls, Mooney said.

A neighbor smelled smoke Thursday but saw nothing, then returned from a trip to Bath that afternoon, saw the fire and reported it, Mooney said. Mooney was first to arrive. The home was fully involved in the fire, he said.

The response from area departments Thursday was great, Mooney said when he was back at the scene Friday due to a reported rekindle. “One town can’t do this without mutual aid these days.”

A 600-foot hose remained unrolled on the driveway Friday morning from the night before, in case of a rekindle. Friday’s did not surprise him, due to the fire’s severity, he said.

Putting out hot spots is brutal work, Mooney said. “All we can do is flood it and dig out what we can.” A second rekindle occurred Friday afternoon, so a back hoe was used to expose areas to put water on. There had been no further rekindles, Mooney said Saturday night.

Lane serves on Westport Fire Department’s board of directors and on the First Responders team, Mooney said. Asked if it is harder from a personal standpoint when working on a fire that strikes a member’s home, Mooney said, “It adds to it.”

Dreyfus and Lane expressed their thanks Saturday for all those who responded to Thursday’s fire.

“They left their jobs to come and they were there for hours. They did a heck of a job,” Lane said. Not only that, since then, some of the same firefighters including ones from out of town have been offering to help and wanting to know what they could do, the couple said.

So has the rest of the community, in and outside Westport Island.

“They’ve been offering us support and help, food, a place to stay. It’s amazing,” Lane said.

“They’ve been wonderful,” his wife said. “We’re very fortunate to live in Maine and this community.”

The couple have mixed feelings on whether they were fortunate to have been in Boston babysitting a grandchild when the fire happened. Had they been home, maybe they could have reported it in time and saved the home, or maybe the lightning or the fire would have killed them, Lane said.

“We might not be here now,” Dreyfus said.

Their German shepherd Gracie was also away, boarding at a Windham kennel due to a family member’s dog allergy that prevented her from joining the couple in Boston.

The couple picked up their dog Saturday. Then they took her to the fire scene so she would understand why they weren’t going home to stay.

“She’s confused right now,” Dreyfus said later.

They all are, Lane said. Disoriented is a good word for it, he added.

He and his wife have lost all of their belongings except the clothes they were wearing, he said.

The loss of their home has been a shock and they are not sure if they will rebuild, or maybe rent a home on the island, the couple said. For now, friends who are away in Florida are letting them use their home. Dreyfus and Lane stayed at a Bath hotel the first couple of nights after the fire.

“We’re trying to get some normalcy back,” Lane said in Saturday night’s telephone interview. “And a big loss besides the clothes is the family pictures,” he said.

“Today is the first day of life starting over again. The past is gone,” Lane continued. “We don’t know what the next chapter will be.”