Huge fire breaks out near main D.C. traffic routes

A spectacular three-alarm fire broke out Friday night in a vacant former D.C. firehouse that was undergoing renovation, the fire department said. An adjacent building was also damaged, officials said.

Firefighters were sent about 7:20 p.m. to quell the blaze in the historic 19th-century building in the 1600 block of N. Capitol Street NW.

As of about 11 p.m. they had apparently extinguished all visible fire but were still streaming water into the building, fire department spokesman Vito Maggiolo said.

He said firefighters would probably remain at the scene all night.

It appeared that a gas line may have fueled the fire at first, and the blaze was well along by the time firefighters arrived, Maggiolo said.

It appeared that a firefighter had become trapped inside while combating the flames. However, the department said the situation had been “resolved” without apparent injury.

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Firefighters in the building were ordered to evacuate.

Flames leaped into the air from the roof of the ornate brick structure in the Dutch Revival style, as firefighters sought to quell the blaze with water streamed from portable towers stationed outside.

At the peak of firefighting operations, authorities sent seven towers to the scene, along with about 20 other pieces of equipment and 125 firefighters.

City officials issued an alert telling residents of the surrounding neighborhood, near North Capitol Street and Florida Avenue NW, that they might see or smell smoke.

Residents were asked to close doors and windows and remain indoors.

Several nearby houses were evacuated as a precaution, the fire department said.

The onetime firehouse appeared to be connected to one or more other structures that formed part of a new development, Maggiolo said.

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It appeared that the blaze also involved an adjacent four-story building that was part of the development, Maggiolo said.

No estimate of damage was available, but “some of the buildings in the development” appeared “very heavily damaged,” Maggiolo said.

The cause of the blaze was not immediately known.

The former firehouse, in the Bloomingdale area, near Eckington and Truxton Circle, dates to the last decade of the 19th century and was a District historic landmark. It had once housed Engine Co. No. 12. It was vacated by the fire department in 1987, according to a website on historic D.C. buildings.

Since then, it had been repurposed at least twice and had once housed a restaurant.

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