13887/1A FIRE that swept through a narrow boat on the Kennet and Avon Canal by the Barge Inn at Honey street early on Monday could have been started by intruders.

The fibreglass hulled Kismet a Middle Eastern word for fate was reduced to a smouldering wreck by the 6am blaze.

The 38ft-long boat was the pride and joy of Devizes couple Sandy and Doreen Sadler.

The boat was unique, a devastated Mr Saddler told the Gazette, and the only survivor out of four fibreglass hulled craft that were built in the Midlands in the 1960s.

Mr Sadler, a retired royal Navy submariner, and his wife bought the boat about 15 years ago.

It had been used as a houseboat in the Cumberland Basin in Bristol, and was in a very poor state when they purchased it.

They lavished care and thousands of pounds in restoring the boat that they used for holidays and family days out on the Kennet and Avon.

The Sadlers used the boat last week and moored it outside the Barge Inn on Saturday to return home.

They had a telephone call from the Barge licensees June and Adrian Potts at 6am on Monday to say the Kismet was on fire.

Firefighters from Pewsey and Devizes were sent to the blaze but were unable to prevent the flames destroying most of the living quarters at the stern end and gutting the rest of the accommodation.

Firefighter Chris Wootton from Pewsey said: "We could see the smoke and flames when we got to the cross roads at Alton Barnes.

"We knew it was a narrow boat on fire and we realised that if anybody was still inside we could be dealing with a tragedy."

Their fears that people might be on board were heightened when they arrived and found the boat's diesel outboard motor was running.

However, firefighters quickly ascertained that the boat was not occupied.

They still had to go aboard the blazing craft to remove a gas cylinder that could have exploded and also to remove the engine's fuel tank, which was the only way to stop the engine running.

Mr and Mrs Sadler and the fire fighters were mystified as the why the boat's engine was running because, if intruders had intended to steal the boat, its mooring ropes had not been untied.

They conjectured that the blaze had melted insulation on the wires of the boat's ignition system causing it to short-circuit and start the engine.

A fire brigade investigation officer was able to establish that the seat of the fire was the cockpit area where there was nothing that could have caused a blaze.

Mr Wootton said they were unable to rule out that intruders had broken into the boat and started the fire either deliberately or accidentally.

As Mr Sadler viewed the burnt-out hull he said: "I am absolutely devastated because we had brought it back to life and now it's dead."

He said the fire had been so severe that it had damaged the fibreglass hull, rendering restoration impossible.

He said he and his wife had bought the Kismet while the Kennet and Avon was still undergoing restoration after being largely derelict for decades.

He said: "At the time when we bought her, the restored Kennet and Avon was in its infancy, and there were only three or four boats on the canal."

The fire was discovered by campers from the site behind the pub who had risen early to leave.