A significant fire damaged a large commercial building Saturday evening in Oxford.
Oxford fire officials reported responding to the blaze at 822 Main Street shortly before 7:30 p.m.
The structure accommodates several businesses.
Due to the smoke, races at the nearby Oxford Plains Speedway were briefly halted.
Fortunately, there were no injuries, and the building’s sprinkler system is credited with preventing further destruction.
Authorities are still investigating the cause of the fire.
A crew was notified of a fire alarm at 7:47 p.m. and arrived under 4 minutes, the department said.
“Engine 14 found an alarm sounding with smoke from a roll up door,” EDF stated. “The crew called for a full commercial alarm assignment bringing 3 additional engines, 2 trucks, 2 BCs and an ambulance.”
Crews made entry in to the building and were confronted by heavy smoke from a fire within a machine shop.
Firefighters were able to quickly extinguish the fire which was held in check by the sprinkler system.
Crews are working to clear smoke and overhaul the fire.
There were no injuries and the fire is under investigation.
At 3:30 a.m., crews were called to the building in the 1400 block of Madison Street. A fire was found inside a fourth-floor unit.
When firefighters arrived, the flames were under control, thanks to the building’s sprinkler system, according to the Seattle Fire Department. Crews put out the remaining fire.
No one was hurt.
The cause of the fire is under investigation.
VP of Operations John Walker said no one was hurt and everyone was able to get out of the building safely.
An ABC 17 News reporter was able to hear fireworks going off at the scene.
Walker at the scene said the business was alerted around 1 p.m. Monday that fire alarms were going off and found a fire contained to one area. Walker said the fire was contained to one area of the building.
A cause of the fire was not known as a Monday afternoon. Walker said it appeared that the sprinkler system went off as it was supposed to, and that 20 employees were working in the building at the time.
No injuries were reported.
The fire was still burning as of 6:20 p.m. Firefighters have not been able to go inside the building because conditions are not safe, according to Cooper County Fire Protection District Lt. William Johnson. Firefighters are expecting to be on the scene until 10 p.m. It will likely take days to determine the cause of the fire, Johnson said.
“We are on the scene of a working structure fire at Spirit of 76 fireworks. This is mutual aid to Boonville Fire,” the Cooper County Fire Protection District wrote on its Facebook page.
Laurie Little works at the Holiday Inn on Mid-America Industrial Drive near the warehouse.
Little said she was at work at the time, when she remembers hearing a ‘pop,pop,pop’ and seeing an “explosion” in the sky when she looked out the window. She said she soon recognized the sound as fireworks because her family used to own a fireworks company, but it was concerning at first.
“It was scary at first because I was like if somethings exploding in that building and there’s the capacity to just keep exploding we’re not too far away from that,” Little said. “So, you know it was a little bit unnerving at first but then you know I thought at the time it’s gotta be fireworks because once the initial explosion kinda cleared… right like you could see it more drifting off like firework smoke.”
Around 9:30 p.m., the Penetanguishene Fire Department responded to a report of a structure fire at 58 Church Street, fire chief Richard Renaud wrote in an email to Barrie 360.
He says crews arrived to find smoke and flames coming from the front door.
“The building, a sprinklered former hospital (Beechwood Hospital), was vacant and for sale at the time of the fire,” said Renaud. “Initial reports were that people were possibly inside. That information turned out to be false.”
Firefighters quickly knocked down the blaze and searched the building.
“The building’s operating sprinkler system kept the fire isolated to the area of origin,” said Renaud. “There were no operating smoke alarms in the building.”
The fire is considered suspicious, according to Renaud. The fire marshal has been contacted and OPP are securing the scene.
He added that there were no injuries to civilians or firefighters.
“[I] would like to remind everyone to make sure they have working Smoke and Carbon Monoxide alarms in their homes,” said Renaud. “Early detection is key in surviving a fire. Test your devices today.”
A residential sprinkler system limited fire damage at a Columbus apartment complex on Monday night.
Columbus Fire Department investigators said that the fire was caused by an improperly discarded cigarette, said Capt. Mike Wilson, fire department spokesman.
At about 6:47 p.m., Columbus firefighters were called to the St. Barts Apartments, 745 Sycamore St., for a fire alarm activation. When the first arriving firefighters arrived on the scene, they reported water flowing from a third floor balcony.
Firefighters used a ground ladder to gain access to the balcony and found an activated sprinkler head, smoldering cardboard boxes and minor fire damage on the exterior of the apartment. Firefighters moved the charred debris to allow water from the sprinkler to extinguish hot spots located within the empty cardboard boxes. When firefighters were sure that hot embers were fully extinguished, firefighters stopped the flow of water from the sprinkler system.
Columbus Fire Department investigators spoke to the apartment’s tenant, who shared that he had been smoking on the balcony approximately 30 minutes prior to the sprinkler system activation. The apartment’s tenant told fire investigators the he was storing empty cardboard boxes on the patio from a recent move.
Fire investigators determined that the tenant had been using an empty cardboard box to discard used cigarettes. The tenant told investigators that he believed he had fully extinguished the cigarette before discarding the cigarette in one of the empty boxes. Investigators have classified the fire as accidental in nature as a result of the improper disposal of smoking materials. Damage to the property is estimated at less than $5,000. No injuries were reported.
The fire incident commander, Capt. Dave Dwyer, said that the sprinkler system operated appropriately and helped to avert a more significant fire. “ With plenty of fuel and oxygen, the fire could have easily spread to other combustible materials or potentially entered the living space, if not for the sprinkler system,” said Dwyer said. The Columbus Fire Department has responded to two fire incidents in the past week that were extinguished by automatic sprinkler systems.
The fire first erupted at the Gateway Energy Storage in the 600 block of Camino De La Fuente late Wednesday, according to Cal Fire. It took crews roughly 24 hours to get the blaze under control and evacuation orders were lifted. But by Friday, the fire had re-ignited and evacuation orders were once again put in place for those in the surrounding area.
By Saturday morning, the fire had spread into other parts of the building and burned a portion of the roof but had not affected any other buildings, according to CalFire. The lithium-ion batteries at the warehouse “continue to experience thermal runaway,” which is when a battery goes into an uncontrollable self-heating state, according to a report released Saturday morning.
Cal Fire said the evacuation orders were issued as people in the area could be affected due to potential poisonous vapors and potential explosions. A shelter-in-place order was, at one point, issued for nearby Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility.
Due to the hazardous fumes filling the energy-storage complex, firefighters used streams of water from powerful hoses to subdue the blaze from outside, supplementing an internal sprinkler system at the business, Cal Fire Capt. Mike Cornette said.
A hazardous materials team was at the scene to ensure air quality and water runoff is not polluted, Cal Fire said.
The cause of the fire was under investigation, Cornette said.
A water sprinkler doused a fire Friday afternoon at an eight-story building in downtown Fresno.
The Fresno Fire Department responded to the fire at 4:45 p.m. at Fulton and Amador streets with reports of a fire that started on the balcony, spokesman Jonathan Lopez said.
The sprinkler system had already extinguished the fire when crews arrived.
No one was displaced.
Lopez credited the Silvercrest Retirement Residence management for helping fire crews get to where the fire started and stressed the importance of having a working sprinkling system.
”This incident really highlights the importance of not having working smoke detectors, but especially in buildings like this working fire suppression,” he said. ”Sprinklers and self-closing doors really minimize the potential disaster that could happen in a high-rise building without these fire protection features.”
Five engines and two ladder trucks responded to the commercial fire.
Dispatch officials said crews responded to a Haven of Rest location on West Orr Street at 1:25 a.m. after someone reported the situation.
According to the Anderson City Fire Department, the fire damaged the building but was mostly contained to a trailer outside. They added that a sprinkler system helped prevent the fire from spreading inside.
Haven of Rest is a non-profit with a discipleship program that focuses on assisting people battling drug addiction. The organization posted the following message following the fire.
The Anderson City Fire Department confirmed no injuries were reported following the incident. However, they are still investigating what caused the fire.
