jersey city fire

A fire broke out Monday night near the top of a high-rise luxury condominium building under construction, prompting evacuations and disrupting light rail service close to the heart of the city's financial district.

There were no reports of injuries.

Dozens of firefighters battled the blaze at the 18-story building, which began in an elevator well between the 17th and 18th floors. The cause was not immediately known.

Firefighters had trouble reaching the fire, partly because the building's standpipe, or source of water, was activated only up to the 14th floor, said Fire Director Armando Roman.

The fire was declared under control shortly before 1 a.m., but firefighters expected to be at the scene for hours longer until pockets of fire inside the building could be extinguished.

Service on the Hudson Bergen Light Rail line was disrupted and police said an area of several blocks around the fire scene would be closed to vehicular traffic on Tuesday morning.

Flames could be seen across the Hudson River in Manhattan. The fire quickly accelerated, feeding on lumber being used to frame interior areas of the upper floors.

The building's steel and concrete construction helped limit most of the damage to the two upper floors and the building itself was in no danger of collapse. Occupancy is slated for the summer of 2009.
Major fire on Jersey City waterfront
by The Jersey Journal Monday October 08, 2007, 10:29 PM
A major fire is lighting up the skies in Downtown Jersey City as the top floor of a building under construction at 77 Hudson St. burns.

The Jersey Journal's Michaelangelo Conte and photographer Reena Rose Sibayan are at the Greene and Sussex streets scene and will send in updates.

The project is the K. Hovnanian luxury condominiums that was in the news just weeks ago when it was learned that a record $6 million had been paid for a two-decker penthouse.

Channel 5 News is reporting that the Jersey City Fire Department has pulled all its people out of the building because the standpipe only goes up to the 15th floor and the fire is above that, on the 16th, 17th and 18th floors.

Falling debris, they said, also made it too dangerous for firefighters to be inside, so the 80 to 100 firefighters on the scene are fighting it from the outside.

The fire can be seen from Manhattan.
Jersey City police are imposing a frozen zone this morning around the scene of a high-rise fire that burned through the night.

Eyewitness News reporter Kemberly Richardson is live in Jersey City.
The frozen zone is still in place this morning because firefighters are still on the scene, putting water on the hotspots on the upper floors. Because it's pretty windy this morning, the flames are being fanned.

It was a much different story last night as the fire broke out just before 9:00 p.m., between the 17th and 18th floors of the high-rise located at 77 Hudson Street.

The building is under construction and played a major role in getting to the upper floors. Initially, crews tried to fight the flames from the inside but had to pull out, because those floors were not stable -- made up only of wet concrete and wooden two-by-fours.

They boarded the top tow floors within the last two days, and it takes really 21 days for concrete to cure. So, in this time frame, it would not be safe to have firefighters in there unless the floor is set and solid...It was a decision the chief made and obviously, it was a rational decision to make....,"

Crews were forced to fight the fire from the outside. However, the ladder trucks can only go up to about 10 stories. And there's also been talk about the building's standpipe (its source of water). It is said to only go up to 14 floors, but officials say that's not a violation.
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