Tough Loss For Harvey After Strip Mall Collapses In Extra-Alarm Blaze
CHICAGO (CBS) -- A fire at a 74-year-old commercial building in south suburban Harvey was still smoldering Friday morning, some 18 hours after it started, causing the building to collapse.
The fire started around 4:45 p.m. Thursday at strip mall at 155th and Broadway in Harvey. The extra-alarm blaze burned for hours until firefighters got it under control Thursday night.
Crews from more than half a dozen neighboring fire departments helped to battle the flames. At the peak of the fire, large clouds of smoke could be seen for miles.
The blaze caused the building to collapse, destroying four stores and the apartments on the second floor.
Harvey lost some of its history with the collapse of the building, which once housed a popular department store for decades. In the 1960s, Sammy Davis Jr. was among the famous clientele who would stop by to shop there.
The fire started in the basement and spread to the upper floors. Burglar bars on the windows prevented firefighters from getting inside. Crews called for foam to try to suffocate the fire in the basement, but by the time foam arrived from Chicago, the fire had already spread to the upper two floors.
About eight or nine people who were working or shopping in the stores were evacuated without injury.
"Once we realized that all the occupants and the merchants had evacuated, it was just too dangerous of a scene to send a fireman in. Inasmuch as they attempted to do it, the fire became just too extensive and just too explosive at that point," Harvey spokesman Sean Howard said.
Firefighters were still at the site late Friday morning, dousing hotspots as the ruins of the building continued to smolder.
Chris Mullen, of Calumet City, showed up at the strip mall Friday morning, hoping to buy a Mother's Day gift, unaware the building had burned down.
"I was heading here to get me a couple of pants and a shirt so I could enjoy the rest of the day, and the weekend for Mother's Day, so now I've got to find somewhere else to go and shop for my Mother's Day gift," he said.
The cause of the fire was under investigation.