Crews work to extinguish a fire in a four-story apartment building in downtown Portland, Ore., May 16, 2023.
Kristian Foden-Vencil / OPB
Crews battled a large fire in a five-story apartment building in downtown Portland on Tuesday.
According to Portland Fire & Rescue, the fire started at about 10:30 a.m. at The May apartments near Southwest 14th Avenue and Taylor Street. Smoke from the four-alarm blaze in the Goose Hollow area was visible across the Willamette River and much of the city.
Smoke from an apartment fire in downtown Portland, Ore., May 16, 2023, is seen from the Wells Fargo Center in this provided photo.
Courtesy of Arnold Benson
Several people were rescued from the building, and shortly afterward crews were ordered to withdraw from the building due to the fire’s growth.
Barbett Grace sat on the pavement and watched the building burn Tuesday. She lived on the third floor and said she didn’t notice the fire alarm at first because they’ve had several false alarms. Then she heard the fire trucks outside.
“So, I opened the door and it was dark and full of smoke,” Grace said. “I just went to the window and climbed out.”
Grace, 67, has arthritis, but she managed to get down the three stories using the building’s fire escape. She had been scheduled to move this week because her doctor worried she wouldn’t be able to use the fire escape. Now, she’s moving six blocks away, but will turn up empty-handed because all her possessions were destroyed in the fire.
Barbett Grace, 67, pictured here on May 16, 2023, lived on the third floor of The May apartments. She said she managed to escape the building using a fire escape after the apartments erupted in flames. Fire officials closed streets around the roughly 113-year-old building out of fear it may collapse from the fire.
Kristian Foden-Vencil / OPB
”It’s mostly just stuff. The paperwork, my veterans paperwork, my drivers license, Social Security card — all of those are going to have to be replaced. And that’s going to be the biggest thing,” she said.
Portland Fire & Rescue spokesperson Rick Graves said many people and animals had to scramble from the building as the fire quickly spread.
“Upon arrival some of the first arriving crews were actually just aggressively running the hallways, slamming doors saying, ‘This is not a false alarm. Get out, get out, get out!’” he said.
Two firefighters suffered minor medical issues, but no other injuries were reported.
Graves added that emergency vehicles moved away from the roughly 113-year-old building in case of a structural collapse. The streets around the building were also closed.
Most of Interstate 405 closed starting around noon Tuesday as smoke from the fire limited visibility on the freeway. The closure resulted in significantly snarled traffic throughout the city in the afternoon, even after the highway reopened.
Portland General Electric also cut power to the area as a precaution.
Firefighters monitored the building overnight into Wednesday morning. Portland’s city engineer will evaluate its stability on Wednesday.
Known issues
The May apartment building was constructed in 1910, according to property records.
Graves called it a “non-sprinkled building” that did have “sprinkled exits.” He said firefighters did not know if the sprinklers worked or whether they went off. An agreement from Aug. 8, 1974, notes The May had some sprinklers along the corridors, stairs and the basement, according to Ken Ray, a spokesperson with the city’s Bureau of Development Services. It also had hardwired smoke detectors, alarms and fire extinguishers, according to that same 1974 agreement.
The fire remains under investigation, though Graves said it appears it began on the third floor.
Records show the building had some documented issues in recent months. On Dec. 1, 2022, the city received a complaint stating the building had “severe leaks, mold, mildew” that there was “exposed electrical wiring” and that there were “no smoke, gas or carbon monoxide detectors.”
The May apartment building, in the Goose Hollow area of Portland, was consumed in a four-alarm blaze on May 16, 2023.
Kristian Foden-Vencil / OPB
On Dec. 15, a Bureau of Development inspector went to the building and documented 10 violations that were sent in a letter to SkyNat Limited Partnership, the property’s owner. The violations included repairing emergency lighting on several floors, replacing an expired fire extinguisher, and addressing electrical extension cords in the lobby “daisy chained with other power strips or extension cords” that created a potential safety or fire hazard.
The city gave SkyNat two months to correct the violations.
”Due to limited staffing, the Bureau of Development Services does not have the resources to re-inspect most buildings on the deadlines set in violation letters,” Ray said in a statement. “It is the property owner’s responsibility to fix the concerns and notify BDS for a re-inspection. That did not happen, and fines began accruing for the uncorrected violations.”
SkyNat paid fines in February and March and, as of April 27, still owes the city $1,723.
The Bureau of Development Services inquired last month about the 10 documented violations, and SkyNat told the city it was still fixing the violations. City inspectors returned to the property Monday and found most, but not all of the violations had been fixed.
According to its website, SkyNat is a family business with more than 500 residential units in Portland, Gresham, Vancouver and Tigard. The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
When reached by OPB, a maintenance contractor for the company referred a request for comment to company officials.