Published: July 10, 2009 09:23 pm      

OC firefighters respond to hotel dumpster fire

Firefighters from Orange, McLewis and Pinehurst responded to a dumpster fire Friday at the Comfort Inn, under construction at the corner of Texas 62 and Interstate 10.

Deputy Orange Fire Chief Jerald Ziller said the initial call came in at 4:19 p.m.

“The initial report was a fire outside a hotel at the corner of Highway 62 and Interstate 10. The next call was saying the flames were 9 feet tall, and that they were starting to catch the building on fire,” Ziller said. “All he saw was a wall of fire from the ground to the roof.”

Ziller said firefighters performed a quick attack on the base of the of the fire, which he said looked like it started in cardboard boxes in between the dumpster and the building. After the fire was out, however, Ziller said firefighters noticed another problem.

“We put out the dumpster fire, and we were going through checking for hotspots, when we noticed this big shipping container with smoke coming out of it,” Ziller said.

Firefighters had the container moved so as not to burn more of its contents, which were later discovered as a number of flat-screen televisions; Ziller estimated about 40 of the televisions were lost to the fire.