DETROIT – A fire broke out Saturday at a spice storage building near Eastern Market in Detroit.
As the crowds gathered at the busy Eastern Market on Saturday, there was a different smell in the air -- the blowing smoke from a food warehouse which caught fire just after 9 a.m.
Firefighters responded to Division Street, just off Orleans Street, but the fire moved quickly after starting on the second floor.
"Unfortunately it burned into the ceiling area between the ceiling and the roof, and it spread. So in the interest of safety, we pulled our people out," Deputy Commissioner David Fornell said.
That forced crews to battle the fire from the outside only. At the start of the fire, several people were inside the building.
"There were workers inside. They all evacuated," Fornell said.
Once everyone was accounted for, Detroit fire had the intensity of the fire and the summer heat to deal with as marketgoers were slightly inconvenienced by the commotion.
"There's a lot of people in the Eastern Market. Luckily we were able to get in here," Fornell said. "You can see the streets are very tight, so a lot of companies had to park a block or two away."
It took fire crews several hours to finally get this fire under control, and once inside, they determined there was something fishy about how this broke out.
"Our arson people are here. They're interviewing witnesses right now," Fornell said. "When we get the fire knocked out and make sure the people is safe to enter, then we'll go inside and do a cause-in-origin investigation."
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