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StumbleuponFire at former GM parts plant was probably set, officials say
Friday, August 15, 2008
DAYTON — Fire continued to burn Friday morning, Aug. 15, at two buildings at a former General Motors Corp. parts plant on Taylor Street that were began burning Thursday afternoon in what is believed to be an intentionally set fire.
Assistant Fire Chief Michael Caudill said Friday morning that some of the fire is contained in portions of the old buildings that fire crews can't get into safely. He said heavy equipment will probably be brought in to knock down some walls to allow firefighters to attack the remaining fire from ground level.
Caudill said that once the fire is out, investigators will enter to try to determine how it started.
Firefighters are not attempting to save any of the structures because they were scheduled for demolition anyway to make room for the site to be redeveloped as part of Dayton's Tech Town project.
Dayton East District Fire Chief Ron Fleming said contractors were not working in the buildings when the fire erupted about 4 p.m. Thursday. Fleming called the fire "suspicious," adding that three or four other fires have struck the site in the past year or so.
The four-alarm fire required the use of all of the city's fire trucks and 75 firefighters and command staff on duty Thursday afternoon, Fleming said. Firefighters from Kettering assisted at the scene, while firefighters from Trotwood, Riverside and Wright-Patterson Air Force Base stood by to respond to calls in other parts of the city.
Thick black smoke billowed from the site early on, and traffic on nearby streets was blocked as firefighters attacked the blaze.
The fire stubbornly resisted efforts to extinguish it, Fleming said. Firefighters used five aerial trucks to fight the fire, and at one point were pouring an estimated 10,000 gallons of water per minute on the blaze.
No injuries were reported.
Four pieces of fire apparatus remained on the scene Friday morning, Caudill said.
The two buildings on fire are part of the city's Tech Town campus at 300 Taylor St. Both are scheduled for demolition. The buildings are 75 to 80 years old and have concrete walls and floors and wooden roofs.
The buildings are part of the old Harrison Radiator complex, a prime location the city has been developing as a high-tech campus since 2000. Several trucks were on the site pouring concrete for a new building there, even as Dayton fire crews battled the fire.
Norm Essman, Citywide Development's redevelopment director for Tech Town, said the burning buildings — known as Building 10 and 13 — are on the east end of the site. He did not know their dimensions, but said they are "big."
Both should have been vacant.
Essman, who was at the scene, did not know the cause of the blaze.
"It's a mystery at this point. All the asbestos work was done," he said. "Nobody had reason to be in there."
Essman did say that people walking on nearby railroad tracks often enter the site.
The blaze is the second this summer on the redevelopment site. A warehouse building, also slated for demolition, burned June 30.
"This in no way will delay our efforts to develop Tech Town," Essman said.
