Firefighters in San Jose confronted multiple fires at once in an east San Jose neighborhood Sunday evening.
The San Jose Fire Department posted on social media at 5:45 p.m. that it was responding to three separate fires near Quimby Road and Sand Point Drive. At 6:30 p.m., the department said six buildings were affected across two residential blocks.
At the scene Sunday night, fire department Capt. Thomas Lo said firefighters faced hazardous conditions aggravated by heat and wind but kept the damage to homes confined to three residences.
Everyone from each building was evacuated and no injuries were reported, the department said.
Lo said calls came in just before 5 p.m. about a residential fire on Sand Point. “The first arriving crew found heavy fire in the garage in one of the residences,” Lo said. As firefighters began to attack that blaze, residents in the area reported more fires, Lo said. “It appears the embers were being cast from … the initial fire and they were carried across the street into two separate locations across Quimby,” Lo said.
Khoi Nguyen of San Jose said his grandmother called him Sunday evening and said her house on Sand Point was burning. Nguyen, 25, believes flames spread to his grandma’s home from the house next door and that she lost all her important documents, including her passport and drivers license. His grandma planned to stay at his sister’s house, he added.
Johnny Uy, who lives next to one of the houses that burned on Sand Point, said he went out Sunday afternoon for a beverage then saw black smoke in his neighborhood. Uy, 37 returned to find the house next door engulfed in fire, he said. “I’m just grateful everyone got out safely,” Uy said.
NBC Bay Area broadcast footage from a helicopter showing smoke coming from what appeared to be one home or two adjacent homes, and another house in a different block across a four-lane street. Zoomed-in video showed flames erupting through a home’s roof with a fire department ladder truck beside it.
The fire department tweeted photos of two ladder trucks pouring water onto a burning structure.
Lo said Sunday night around 7 p.m. that fire crews expected to spend the next few hours making sure all hot spots were out in all the affected structures.
Bay Area News Group staff photographer Nhat Meyer contributed to this report.
Source: www.mercurynews.com