Home»BALTIMORE CITY FIRE DEPARTMENT»INCIDENTS»2017 Fires and Incidents»1-Alarm 5601 Eastern Ave. 11-21-17

On November 21, 2017 Ambulance 25 was returning back to their quarters from a run when they spotted heavy smoke and fire from the roof of a building across the street. They asked Communications to strike out the box for the old PEMCO Company building.
The building is part of a complex that sits on a 20 acre lot. For nearly a century the PEMCO Company manufactured inorganic pigments and specialty glass used to produce porcelain enamel and ceramic glaze before closing down in 2007 and moving operations to Alabama. In 2014 the property was sold to a local investment group that announced plans to redevelop the site into retail shops, hotels and residential units.
Homeless people have been known to frequent the buildings and several fires have occurred in the buildings in recent years. The most recent was a 2-alarm fire in February of 2015.
Fire Box T20-1 was dispatched at 1209 hours and units arrived to find heavy billowing black smoke and flames from the roof top of the 2-story 100’ X 100’ warehouse. Companies initially entered the building and made their way to the second floor but the fire above them in the roof was too far advanced for the hand lines to do any good. Battalion Chief 1, in command, withdrew them and ordered ladder pipes on each side of the building and requested a working fire assignment at 1213 hours. The Water Tower was special called about 15 minutes later. Smoke could be seen from all parts of the City as the whole roof was becoming fully involved. Smoke was also blowing in the direction of Bayview Hospital located across the street behind Truck 20’s quarters and was causing some concern. There were no exposure problems and the fire was kept in check to the roof. Most of the roof burned and fell into the second floor but didn’t spread as the building had concrete floors.
It took 50 firefighters about 2 ½ hours before it was brought under control. No injuries were reported.