Apartment Building, Residential Salina, KS – Loft apartment fire brought under control with help from sprinkler system April 22, 2015 viking210 Firefighters had a fire that started in a loft apartment above Laura’s Antiques in the 100 block of South Santa Fe Avenue in downtown Salina under control within about 40 minutes Tuesday night, said Salina Fire Marshal Roger Williams. Williams said the fire was initially seen in a patio area of the loft apartment above Laura’s Antiques, 109 S. Santa Fe. He said it might have spread into the loft apartment above That 1 Bar, 111 S. Santa Fe, which is protected by an automatic sprinkler system. “It (the sprinkler system) did activate, and that definitely helped our operation,” Williams said. Williams said there were no people in either loft apartment, and a small number of people in the bar were safely evacuated. There was smoke visible at the scene, but no flames. The loft above Laura’s Antiques was being renovated. During that work in early March, some plaster was removed from what had been the exterior wall of 111 S. Santa Fe to reveal a sign painted on the wall from Salina’s earliest days. The black-and-white sign was for “G. Sauer, Boots and Shoes,” a company that opened in 1870 and had closed by 1885. About 20,000 pounds of plaster was removed from the walls during renovation.
