Warehouse fire today

Two blocks down the street is a bridge across the Maumee River.  I love to look upstream in the evening just before sunset to see the reflection of downtown Fort Wayne in the water of the river.  It is my favorite view of downtown.  Tonight the bridge was closed to the public.  The emergency officials (fire and police) who were on the bridge were probably too busy too watch the lights come on downtown.

This afternoon a fire started in what back in the day had been the Wayne Pump Co.  Now it is a mix of empty and and repurposed warehouses and businesses.  I first saw the Journal Gazette notice of the breaking news just before I left work this afternoon.  The plume of black smoke was unmistakable even 6 miles away across town.   Here is what Google has the site looking like.

The electric company had turned off power to the neighborhood sometime this afternoon.  It came back on at 9:24 this evening.  I'll  be interested to read to read the news reports of how big this fire turned out to be.  I could see fire trucks from outside of Fort Wayne.  The river greenway runs right across the Maumee from the warehouses, so getting views of the scene was easy, though we were well out of the firefighter's way.

Here are some pictures of what Pete and I saw this evening.

From just north of the fire site.

Flames are visible in the center of the picture as the warehouse next to the railroad tracks burns.

More flames.

Smoke obliterating the view of the building and tracks.

Six buildings were in the complex..  This one has already collapsed.

From two blocks east of the fire, the setting sun the smoke and the railroad tiracks that seem to have been closed all afternoon and evening.