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Officials describe rapid spread of construction fire in Mission Bay; no adjacent buildings lost
Summary
City staff and the fire department updated commissioners on a large construction fire in Mission Bay South that required a defensive strategy because of exposed wood framing and lack of active fire protection; staff said adjacent buildings were protected and full damage assessment is ongoing.
Assistant Chief Postel told the commission that San Francisco firefighters responded to a five‑alarm fire at a market‑rate building under construction in Mission Bay South on March 11, 2014, and adopted a defensive strategy because the upper floors were wood‑framed and lacked drywall, sprinklers and alarms. "When the exposed wooden members were exposed to the heat and flame, there was rapid fire spread," Postel said, and the department decided to protect exposures rather than risk firefighters' lives by interior operations.
Catherine Riley, the Mission Bay project manager, said the building (identified in staff materials as a roughly 170‑unit market‑rate apartment; project remarks also described it as 172 units) is Block 5 on Fourth Street. Riley said adjacent blocks — including a 192‑unit building directly across the street and a 147‑unit building to the north — experienced smoke and water damage; as of the end of the prior week, she said roughly 50 units in the nearby Block 4 and four units in Block 3 West were uninhabitable for safety checks. "We're hopeful it's going to be primarily smoke, possibly water damage on that side," Riley said, and developers were working to restore habitable conditions.
Postel described water‑supply challenges in the area, noting that peripheral mains are often dead ends and that crews relied on the city's Auxiliary Water Supply System (AWSS) and coordination with the PUC to boost pressure. He credited firefighters with preventing the fire from spreading to adjacent structures. Riley said demolition to remove unsafe elements on the burned building could take about four to six weeks and that developers hoped to reuse the concrete podium for rebuilding. She added that nearby construction work resumed when safe to do so.
Commissioners asked whether workers were on site when the fire began and when the origin and cause would be known; Postel said the fire investigation unit is working on origin and cause and that most workers had left about an hour before the fire was first detected. Commissioners also raised policy questions about water‑supply infrastructure; staff and Postel noted ongoing AWSS expansion into South of Market under local bonds and said additional system improvements are planned.
The department emphasized that there were no lives to rescue in the burning structure and that, despite the large operation, crews successfully kept the blaze from spreading to the surrounding construction. Staff said they would provide further damage assessments in the coming week or two as insurance and contractor assessments proceed.
The commission received the informational update; no formal action was taken at this presentation.
