KTUU reports that the old Matanuska Maid warehouse in Palmer was destroyed in a fire early Tuesday morning. Palmer Public Safety Director John Owen said dispatchers received a call at 3:30 a.m., reporting the building on fire. Crews arrived to find the 250-by-50-foot building "fully engulfed," according to dispatchers quoted in a short video on KTUU's site.
The warehouse was built in the 1930s and had been unused for many years, according to the Palmer Post. When the firefighters arrived on the scene, they could see that the building would be a total loss, so they focused their efforts on preventing the spread of the blaze to the Crowley Maritime Corp. fuel sales offices next door. Petroleum products inside the office would be a huge problem should they catch fire, Owen told the Palmer Post.
By 5 a.m., the fire was 95 percent contained. By 6:40 a.m., the fire was fully under control. Both the Palmer Fire and Mat-Su Central Fire Department were on the scene, utilizing a "surround and drown" strategy, with 31 pieces of firefighting equipment battling the blaze, according to the Palmer Post.
Owen told KTUU that a fire marshal has been called to investigate. He added that there was nobody inside the building as far as he knew.
Read more at KTUU, and at Palmer Post.
Anyone with information regarding the fire is asked to call Sgt. Shayne La Croix of the Palmer Police Department at 745-4811.