GREENFIELD — A fire broke out in a building in downtown Greenfield on Thursday evening, badly damaging the two businesses and two apartments housed inside.
Local 911 dispatchers received multiple calls as passersby spotted smoke and flames pour out of the windows and roof of a building at 231 W. Main St. in downtown Greenfield.
The cause of the fire was unknown at press time. Greenfield firefighters had the blaze under control within 20 minutes, according to police radio traffic.
The building houses two businesses — Ford’s Flooring and G/D Investment Properties — on its first floor and two apartments on its second floor, officials said.
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The occupants of at least one of the apartments were home when the fire started, according to fire department officials. Everyone made it out of the building safely and without injury.
Representatives from the American Red Cross were called to assist the families that were displaced.
Fire crews were on scene within seconds of receiving the call for help; the affected building sits right around the corner from the Greenfield Fire Territory’s downtown station.
Police blocked West Main Street at Pennsylvania Street while firefighters battled the flames. Residents gathered along Main Street to watch as the first-responders at work.
Careful not to allow their crew members to overheat on the hot in the afternoon sun, Greenfield Fire Territory’s leaders passed out bottles of water to firefighters and used their own EMT equipment to check heart rates and blood pressure.
Thursday’s fire the second time in less than a year that a downtown businesses were badly damaged by flames.
Four businesses in Greenfield’s Riley Park Plaza burned on Nov. 10 when a paint booth in Mueller Auto Body caught fire and spread through the adjacent storefronts. It took fire crews from five county fire departments more than seven hours to fully douse the blaze.