By Louis Krauss
Star Tribune
MINNEAPOLIS — A fire raged through a large homeless encampment Tuesday night in south Minneapolis, damaging two neighboring homes and displacing housed residents as well as the camp’s occupants.
Minneapolis fire crews responded about 10:30 p.m. Tuesday to reports of a fire in the 2400 block of 15th Avenue S., according to a Minneapolis Fire Department news release. The empty plot of land, at 2415 15th Ave. S had been the site of a large encampment with tents and yurts.
Firefighters found several tents fully engulfed in flames, and several propane tanks exploded, causing flames to spread to a house to the south. There was melted siding on the other neighboring house.
The fires were brought under control within 45 minutes, but crews continued to find hotspots in the encampment. No one was injured in the fire, the city said in its release. The cause of the fire is under investigation.
After it was put out, the city brought in tractors and the camp and its occupants were cleared out.
Roughly a dozen people who lived in the camp were in the alley getting car rides from friends Wednesday afternoon. Chance Askenette, 25, said there were about 30 people living at the encampment when it burned, and that about seven lost clothes and other items in the blaze.
“All my belongings, all my clothes, everything I’ve owned is gone,” Askenette said. “It’s devastating.”
Metro Transit buses were requested to accommodate evacuees, and the Red Cross was contacted to provide assistance to eight people who lived in the more severely burned home. They were forced to find new temporary housing.
Neighbor Alex Puma, 24, said he was driving his mom back from her work when he arrived to see “black smoke and raging fire” rising from the encampment.
The camp was established sometime in the summer, Puma said. He said there hadn’t been many issues, though he mentioned that at one point fuel leaked from a propane tank at the camp and spilled into his family’s property. Still, he wasn’t surprised there was a fire given that it had propane tanks and people kept warm with fires.
“We suspected it was going to happen, we just didn’t think it would be this soon,” Puma said.
The camp was a short distance from another large encampment that burned in February on the 1100 block of E. 28th Street.
A fire damage restoration worker at the site said he estimated the work for each house could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.
©2024 The Minnesota Star Tribune.
Visit startribune.com.
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC
