Robert and Karen Phillips stood at the end of James Avenue in Niles Township and watched helplessly as their garage burned to the ground.

“It’s all gone,” Karen said. “Forty years and we’ve never had anything like this happen.”

Karen saw smoke coming from her detached garage at 721 James Ave. shortly after 10 a.m. today.

She called to her husband, who was in the shower. Robert said he tried to put out the fire with a hose, but the water shut off, possibly when a breaker went out.

Robert said a wood-burning stove in the garage may have caused the fire. He lit the stove in the morning to warm the garage. There were stacks of wood near the stove, he said.

“The heat off the stove may have caught the wood on fire,” he said.

Karen was worried the fire might spread to a shed next to the garage. Firefighters from Niles Township and the City of Niles were working to put out the garage fire and make sure it didn’t spread.

The heat from the fire melted the siding on the Phillips’ home.

Robert said he used the garage to store wood and tools.