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Firefighters Working To Find Out What Caused Downtown Warehouse Fire

SACRAMENTO (CBS13) — The Sacramento Fire Department is still trying to figure out led to a four-alarm fire in downtown Sacramento Thursday morning. The fire started in a warehouse near North 16th and B streets.

There were smoke and flames shooting through the sky and bystanders say they couldn't make out what it was.

"I thought it was fog at first coming over the river, but then when I got up here I saw it was too much smoke," said Harry.

There was no mistaking it up close.

"It's been here since I've been here. It's amazing ... this is history and it's a shock to see this building go down like this," Simone said.

The fire department says the building is owned by a Sacramento produce company. Right across from it, is a used office furniture store.

"One of my friends called me and asked me if we were alright," said Steve Ruland of Ruland's Used Office Furniture who first thought the building was his.

"We thought that probably someone had gotten into one of the buildings and started a fire," he said.

Although he was relieved his business was intact, he added that the fire didn't come as a surprise because a lot of transients use the area when going to and from downtown.

It took more than 100 firefighters battling the flames, and a couple hours to completely put it out.

"When you have fire showing from three different sides of the structure that has taken up half of a city block, we're going to slow down a little bit before we go interior on that fire," said Captain Keith Wade, spokesperson for the fire department.

The department says the section of the building where the fire started has been vacant for six months although other parts of the building were still in use. Luckily, no one was hurt.

"We were happy to hear that there wasn't anybody in that fire," Ruland said.

The fire department says the cause of the fire is still under investigation and that it could take days or weeks to find out what led to it.

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