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More than a dozen cars burned in a fire that erupted in the parking lot of a Redwood Shores apartment complex Christmas Eve, according to the Redwood City Police Department.
The blaze, which was reported just after 3 p.m. on Saturday afternoon, burned rapidly through an Indian Creek car lot, sending a large plume of smoke over the bayfront neighborhood and damaging more than 20 vehicles, according to Fire Chief Chris Cottle.
Some 10-15 cars and an overhead shade structure were completely destroyed in what Cottle called a “super visible” first-alarm fire. No injuries were reported.
“It was kind of an odd and tragic event as far as property loss,” Cottle said, describing a thick column of “nasty” fumes that was visible at a distance.
“We don’t get a lot of fires that result in that kind of black, acrid smoke,” said Cottle, who was not present during the fire. “It was, visually, a pretty compelling fire.”
Five engines, one truck and two battalion chiefs were dispatched to the scene of the fire, which was under control in roughly half an hour, Cottle said. The fact that the fire didn’t spread to the nearby residences was “a testament” to the effort of the firefighters, he added.
“It’s a pretty small campus,” he said. “These people aren’t walking far from their cars to their occupancies.”
The Indian Creek apartment complex is located along the Belmont Slough, at 801 Marine Parkway.
The cause of the fire remains under investigation, but preliminary reports suggest that it started in a trash receptacle in the car lot where one of the residents reported seeing some smoke earlier on. Investigators are conducting interviews with residents to try to determine what started the blaze, which Cottle said is likely not the fault of the apartment complex.
“It doesn't seem that there was negligence on the part of Indian Creek, as far as I’m aware,” he said.
Cottle said that the origin of the fire would likely be difficult to determine due to the extent of the damage. However, he noted that fires in public trash cans are fairly common and typically the result of poorly extinguished cigarettes or ashes.
“I think most often people put stuff in there not as a vandalism thing but because they believe it’s extinguished,” he said.
The damage would have been significantly worse had the fire reached the apartment buildings, which are covered in fairly heat-conducive wood shingles. It was “definitely a high-risk fire as far as life risk,” Cottle said.
The complex was built in 1989 and has 185 one- and two-bedroom apartments.
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