Investigators looking into cause of large fire in Uptown neighborhood
Investigators are working to find out what sparked a large, overnight fire at an Uptown neighborhood building in Minneapolis on Wednesday.
A call came in around midnight for the 1700 block of West Lake Street, and Minneapolis Deputy Fire Chief Rita Juran says the fight was tricky from the start.
Despite the large amount of construction that’s happening in the area, Juran said her crews were able to get to the scene relatively quickly. However, due to that same construction, many of the fire hydrants in the area were shut off.
Crews ended up having to go two blocks down the road to find a hydrant that would work for their aerial ladder.
Once crews got to the building—which is home to a psychic reading business and a crystal reading business—firefighters found active flames coming from the second and third floors.
Video of the fire shows some of those flames could be seen going through the roof of the builidng.
“Tried to make the third floor, the stairs were completely burnt out. We also tried to get a ladder up on the third floor so that we could make entry, however, we had too much fire for how much water we were going to be able to put on the fire, so we had crews go defensive. Had everyone come out of the building, set up our big equipment,” said Juran.
One person was inside at the time of the fire, they were able to safely get out.