Preliminary findings by the Rhode Island Office of the State Fire Marshal suggest the early  morning fire on May 20 that seriously damaged the Matunuck Oyster Bar and displaced its 300 workers was accidental, according to reports on May 22.

The investigation into the cause of the blaze continues, but several possible causes have been ruled out, according to a release from the state fire marshal. Commercial cooking equipment was not the direct cause of the fire.

Owner Perry Raso has vowed to rebuild the popular pond-to table seafood restaurant he opened in 2009 on Succotash Road in South Kingstown. Matunuck Oyster Bar employed about 300 workers.

“I want to focus on getting that building repaired so we can open our doors again,” Raso said in an interview on May 22. “I haven’t wrapped my head around everything that’s happened. I just know what the goals are, and I’m just trying to take one step at a time.”

Raso lives down the road from the restaurant and received a call around 3:45 a.m. about the fire from a truck driver who was sleeping in his truck in the parking lot. The driver had hauled a delivery of chairs to be received when the restaurant’s workers started arriving by 6 or 7 a.m.

Raso expressed his gratitude for the outpouring of community support since the fire. Restaurants across the state have reached out to connect with staff who are looking for work, he said. 

“Why not? We’ve got the hardest workers in the world,” he said. “I just hope that when we open our doors again we can get a lot of these people back.”

The Rhode Island Department of Labor and Training (DLT) “has made themselves so available to us and have really given us so much time and been so responsive,” Raso added.

The fire marshal’s office said steps have been taken to “preserve the security and integrity of the fire scene” so that the investigation can continue. Mitigation measures to prevent any contamination to nearby inland waterways have also been taken.