A tchotchke store in the heart of San Francisco's Mission District will have to be demolished as the building that contains it has been deemed too unstable and too dangerous to remain standing after a five-alarm fire ripped through the three-story structure Thursday.
That was the determination of San Francisco Fire Battalion Chief Rudy Rudy Vastellanos on Friday, the day after the fire. He and his crew spent the morning surveying the structural integrity of the Big House Inc. building at 2632 Mission St., which was littered with smoky T-shirts, suitcases, Dora the Explorer dolls and other trinkets sold at the store.
"The steel beams were compromised due to the heat of the fire and won't sustain the weight," he said. "The entire roof has failed. It's a much easier process to take the building down. It's extremely dangerous, we don't want it collapsing."
It was so dangerous, that arson investigators haven't even gone deep inside the shop to determined what caused it, Vastellanos said. He added the owners of the shop have been working with their insurance carrier to figure out the details, and a date to demolish the store has not yet been set.
Fire crews remained on site Friday, putting out a few flare-ups when flames reignited underneath large piles of debris. Sam Romeo, a battalion fire chief, said the department was taking no chances with such a heavy load of fuel around.
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“There’s so much piled up right there. We can’t go through it right now and underneath it does flare up every so often,” Romero said. “We have a crew there hitting hotpots from back, a truck company on either side of the building with a hose line up there hitting from top, and we do have lines set up in case anything does flare up in front.”
The fire was first reported about 1 p.m. and the blaze sent toxic smoke billowing blocks away. At least three people, including two firefighters, suffered smoke inhalation, according to fire officials. Neighbors were also evacuated from their homes during the blaze.
Firefighters were called to the Big House in 2009 and 2013 after there were two separate complaints for fire code violations, Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White said on Thursday. But in both instances, the chief said, the business were able to correct the violations and no citations were issued.
