Cairo fire department battles 7 fires in 8 days

Cairo, Ill. -- The Cairo Fire Department spent the last 30 hours investigating seven "suspicious" fires that broke out in and around Cairo over the course of the past eight days, said Cairo fire chief John Meyer.

The most recent fire occurred Sunday around 9:45 p.m. at Beyond the Bay Bar and Grill on U.S. 51 in Future City, Ill.

Firefighters were at the scene of another fire at an unoccupied house at 736 33rd St., when they received a call that the bar was ablaze.

The building suffered major damage, Meyer said.

This house at 736 33rd St. in Cairo, Ill. is one of several houses that have burned in the city recently. (Fred Lynch)

By the time bar owner George Moss, of Cairo, learned about the the fire, it was after midnight.

Firefighters had already put out the flames by the time he arrived at the scene, he said.

While firefighters kept Moss from entering the building, he said he was able to peek inside the doorway and assess the damage.

"It looked like a total loss," Moss said.

While they were putting out the fire at Beyond the Bay, firefighters had to return to the scene of the 33rd Street house fire, because the flames rekindled after they had been extinguished, Meyer said.

A third fire, at a car parked in the 500 block of 33rd Street, also occurred Sunday night.

This house on Poplar Street in Cairo, Ill. is one of several houses that have burned recently in which arson is suspected. (Fred Lynch)

Meyer said he was unable to assess the damage of the car fire because he hadn't been to the scene yet.

Four more houses in Cairo, all within several blocks of one another, have caught fire since Sept. 8.

The Illinois State Fire Marshal's Office is currently investigating the string of blazes, but they have all been declared suspicious, Meyer said.

Meyer declined to comment on whether it appeared accelerants had been used, but remarked that the points of origin of each fire seemed to be at a different area of each of the seven sites.

Only the fire that started at a house in the 200 block of 12th Street began when the building was occupied, but everyone got out safely, Meyer said.

Just around the corner, a fire on Sept. 14 devastated an empty two-story house on the 1100 block of Poplar Street.

The other house fires occurred at the corner of Union and Elm streets and at an unoccupied house in the 3500 block of Elm Street.

Both structures suffered major damages to the interior and exterior.

bdicosmo@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 245