Fire destroys Ocean’s Daughter Distillery at Westport Winery 

The spirit production building for Ocean’s Daughter Distillery at Westport Winery was destroyed by fire Saturday night, according to an email from the Roberts family that owns the business.

There were no people in the building at the time of the fire and no one was injured, the family reported.

The Roberts, who also live on the Grays Harbor property, were alerted to the fire by drivers on State Route 105 at 10:57 p.m.

One of the people who called 9-1-1 was a winery employee who happened to be passing by. Another good Samaritan pulled into the winery and began fighting the fire with a garden hose, preventing the adjacent winery building and the company’s harvest cargo trailer from catching fire, the Roberts said in their news release.

South Beach Regional Fire District fought the fire for several hours. The pole building was completely destroyed. It contained the business’s still, all its warehoused spirits, shipping supplies, tools, and thousands of empty wine bottles, the Roberts report.

Blain Roberts said, “It was shocking to run out of our house to see a large part of our business going up in flames. We do not know the cause of the fire. At the time, we were distilling water.”

The family used the still to produce hand sanitizer during the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.

His wife, Kim Roberts said, “We are so grateful to Scott, the deckhand from the charter boat Ranger, who was in our yard fighting the fire. We are especially appreciative to the professional and volunteer firefighters who responded to our call. They were with us all night.”

Westport Winery’s tasting room, which includes the Sea Glass Grill and the Ocean’s Daughter Distillery tasting room, was never in danger. The non-profit International Mermaid Museum was also spared from the fire. Those enterprises remain open for business.

The family reports that the building was insured, and they plan to rebuild. There will be a pause in spirit production until they can purchase and install another still in a new building, but there will be no pause in wine production, the news release says.

This story was originally published May 17, 2021 at 1:18 PM.