Fire Chief Stephen H. Bradbury III reports that Newburyport Fire Department extinguished a two-alarm fire in a multi-unit apartment building on the waterfront on Wednesday afternoon.
On Wednesday, May 17, at 2:43 p.m., the Newburyport Fire Department received a report of a fire in a storage unit at 126 Merrimac St., a multi-unit apartment complex.
Companies arrived to find fire showing from an exterior wall of a three-story apartment building with a brick facade and wood frame.
Another apartment building in the complex was only about a dozen feet away from the site of the fire, so companies attacked the body of the fire while also working to protect the other exposed building. Gusty winds on Wednesday presented a challenge to firefighters and increased the importance of protecting the other exposed building. A second alarm was struck to ensure there was enough manpower on scene to protect other buildings.
The fire managed to burn into the kitchen of one of the units in the building, leaving fire damage in that unit. Fire damage was contained to that one unit, though, and four other units suffered smoke damage.
The resident in one unit was displaced. There were no reported injuries.
The cause of the fire remains under investigation by the Newburyport Fire Department.
“Companies performed very well in difficult, windy conditions to knock down this fire quickly and prevent it from reaching other units,” said Chief Bradbury.
Firefighters from Amesbury, Salisbury, Newbury and Seabrook, N.H., provided mutual aid at the scene. Firefighters from West Newbury, Rowley and Hampton, N.H., provided coverage of Newburyport stations.