A fire was reported in a vacant building on the corner of University Avenue and Campus Commons Road at 4:15 p.m., just over a mile away from Sacramento State’s campus across the river. The fire is currently contained as of 5 p.m., and it is unknown if anybody was inside the building at the time of the fire.
The cause of the fire is currently unknown, but Sacramento Fire Department said they are investigating suspicious circumstances. Sac FD’s Public Information Officer Jason Sylvia said that it is unknown if this fire was related to the fire on American River Parkway on March 27 in another vacant building. Reports say that the building has burned before, with the last tenant being a law office that moved out in December.
“Because they had such advanced fire conditions on arrival, knowing that this is vacant and there was so much fire inside, the survivability profile for anyone being inside is pretty much zero,” Sylvia said.
Maddie Souther, an alumna from Sac State who graduated in 2022 with a bachelor’s degree in communication studies, said that she works nearby and noticed the plume of smoke from her office. She said that she was initially worried that her coworkers or friends working in the area were safe, and was relieved to hear that no injuries or deaths were reported.
“I work with a lot of these offices around here, so I was curious to see if any of these were my coworkers,” Souther said. “I heard all the sirens in the helicopter, so I kind of thought something bad had happened.”
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Alex Sawicky, a junior graphic design major at Sac State, said that he was relieved that the fire had been contained with no reported injuries. He said that the fire response was immense and impressive.
“I saw a big black plume of smoke going up into the sky. And I was like, well, ‘I should probably call 911,’ but I heard the sirens coming from every direction,” Sawicki said. “They’re doing everything they can to make sure it doesn’t spread. When I first came over here, there was huge flames coming off of it.”
Sylvia said there was double the normal response considering the severity of the fire, with 10 engines, six trucks, two ambulances and a myriad of first response and command teams.
This story is ongoing, and will be updated as information becomes available.
Additional reporting by Andrea Rivera.
