This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
A four-alarm fire at a Salt Lake City warehouse is under control and nearly extinguished.
The fire, reported about 3:30 p.m. Sunday, started at 879 S. Gladiola St., near a 78,000-square-foot, one-story building used by the companies USA Premium Leather Furniture, Mountain Leather Works and two other businesses.
Salt Lake City Fire Captain Mark Bednarik said semi-trailers, garbage bins and pallets caught fire before the blaze began to spread to the building itself, as firefighters arrived. The flames destroyed at least two semi-trailers, torched an acre of tall grass north of the building and damaged the exterior of the building.
Sprinklers helped contain the fire inside and kept the blaze from spreading to nearby businesses, Bednarik said, though about 2 inches of standing water was left inside.
"There's not much interior damage," Bednarik said.
Firefighters expected to keep working on the remaining pockets of fire in the shipping container and yard throughout Sunday night. They were using firefighting foam and a bulldozer to do so. An initial cost estimate of the damage was about $150,000, according to a news release.
No employees were there at the time the fire began, Bednarik said, and there were no injuries.
A neighbor, Pat Klarr, said she called 911 after seeing plumes of black smoke and flames.
Some explosions also occurred; they were attributed to propane cylinders for forklifts, according to a news release.
The blaze originated as a three-alarm fire, but it was upgraded to a four-alarm fire about 4 p.m., prompting at least an additional 20 firefighters to head to the scene and assist the 40 who arrived earlier. Seventy-three firefighters were involved.
There was no initial indication that the fire was suspicious, Bednarik said. Fire investigators are looking into what caused the blaze.
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