Wild Fire

The construction in the lower Manhattan area paused for days because of a fire started from one of the deconstructing building. Sources indicated a gas leak under the foundation, most likely from the sewage pipe, that incinerated with a cigarette. The flame caught up very quickly and spread to its surrounding buildings, which escalated the whole situation under an hour.

The firefighters all over the five boroughs were called for duty. However, the fire was not put out three days later. The city evacuated the nearby neighborhood and restricted the access to the area as a precaution, though not everyone was happy with the temporary reallocation to the Bronx.

Six buildings were torched during the fire with only one of them, a just started building collapsed. The other five survived the burn but left much to clear and rebuilt. Officials estimated the fire would stalled the project for another three months, pulled back the finish date to as soon as 2026.

After the fire, the city cancelled all restriction and evacuation order. And some strange things happened during that three days. Besides some of them had filed stolen properties to the police department, three bodies were found in an alleyway close to where the fire started.

The police had not identified the three bodies yet and had no clue in the petty theft around the neighborhood.

Since the roads were closed down and the people who could access were the firefighter and the police, the public turned to them and suspected some of them committed the crime during down time. Aerial footage captured by drones controlled by both news media and private bodies during that three days were released online, many had spent weeks searching for suspicious activities but found nothing concrete.

Almost four weeks later, the police confirmed the three bodies found in the restricted zone to be the construction workers working in that site. The police suspected at least one of them were smoking and caused the fire, and the cause of death was possibly by the wild fire.

The police also arrested several people suspected of break-in and theft during the fire. They were suspected of selling items on the Internet that matched the list of stolen properties reported.

With the construction back into track, the city also raised its bar on the safety standard of the construction sites.