Residents Displaced, Cleanup Underway Following 4-Alarm Fire In Center City
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Seven families were displaced in Tuesday night's fire on Locust Street in Center City.
A team inspectors walked out of the ice-covered home with little optimism the home can be salvaged. The roof collapsed and took down nearly everything in its path to the ground level.
Tonight, city officials say the burnt out building poses an imminent danger.
Karen Guss with L&I says construction crews are removing loose masonry and a free-standing elevator shaft.
"Once that partial demolition is competed and the area is safe, we'll be able to assess if there needs to be a complete demolition," said Guss.
She says time is a big factor in all of this as a storm threatens to bring up to a foot of snow to the area this weekend, so she says it will be a very active scene for the next couple of days.
Many of the families that were displaced were being sheltered by the Red Cross. Some lost everything but the clothes on their backs.
"It hit me then. We have nothing. No home, no clothes, not even a toothbrush," Todd Nuttell told Eyewitness News.
Nearly everything Nuttell and his fiancé Christopher Molinari owned was destroyed after a massive fire gutted their apartment building in the Rittenhouse-Fitler historic district Tuesday night.
"I'm not expecting anything to be salvageable," he said. "We made it out alive. The rest is just stuff but it's everything that made us, us."
That included photos, electronics and clothing. But the most meaningful loss, Nuttell says, is his engagement ring. He says he took off the band to do the dishes right before the fire sparked.
For Nuttell, that's hard to watch. But he says love is more than a symbol, and a home is more than just a place.
"It's a thing that can be replaced. We are alive. Our neighbors are safe. Our dog is safe. Just gotta start over, rebuild and make it better."
CBS 3's Anita Oh contributed to this report.
