South Bend apartment fire rekindles; crews extinguish it again

 

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- Crews were called back out to a building after a fire there rekindled.

Firefighters were called back out to the 1600 block of Miami Street just before 5:30 p.m. Monday after a hot spot rekindled on the second floor.

After rekindling, the fire was put out again by the fire crews.

Crews originally were called out to the building just before midnight after the apartment fire left at least eight people without a home in South Bend.

When crews arrived they were in defensive mode for hours after that, because the smoke and flames kept flaring up.

At least four different apartments were affected by the blaze. It's not yet clear how it started.

No injuries were reported in the fire.

"This is an old building so that fire found its way up into these void spaces," said Battalion Chief Chris Baker. "It made it real difficult to see what was going on, we actually ended up putting up one of our drones with flare capability on it so it was able to penetrate straight through that smoke and really give eyes on that building."

The fire department said the building is a "total loss."

The cause of the fire remains under investigation.

Stick with ABC 57 News as this breaking news story develops.