Ann Fairchild and Leslie Moseley grabbed what they could Thursday afternoon as smoke filled Fairchild’s family business, Painters Ice Cream shop in Garden City Beach.
Moseley had just served two customers about 2:30 p.m. when an employee of the adjacent Pacific Beachwear store ran into the ice cream shop and said, “Please call 911; the roof is on fire,” the women said.
In the end, fire destroyed both businesses and two vehicles in the parking lot.
Billowing smoke and flames made worse by windy conditions forced emergency officials to close both lanes of U.S. 17 Business for several hours, and the blaze melted power lines and left nearly 3,000 without power for more than an hour.
Moseley said she was concerned with getting her two customers safely out of the building.
“I grabbed my purse and the register and ran out, but outside you couldn’t breathe, it was so thick; it burnt your lungs,” Moseley said.
Fairchild added: “She quickly served her customers, and they bolted because the ceiling was filling with smoke.”
When firefighters arrived, heavy smoke and flames were coming from the shared roof over the two businesses, said Chief Norman Knight with the Murrells Inlet/Garden City Fire Department.
Passing motorists made multiple calls to 911 to report the fire, which was in the 2100 block of U.S. 17 South, Knight said.
The beachwear store worker met firefighters when they arrived and told them the fire started in the roof of his building and that no one was inside the businesses, Knight said. The employee said he had been in the attic earlier, and when he went back up there to store another item, he saw smoke.
No injuries were reported, but the beachwear employee, who was not identified, was taken to a local hospital to be checked out, Knight said.
More than 50 firefighters from Knight’s department, Surfside Beach, Midway and Horry County battled the blaze. Myrtle Beach firefighters moved to Surfside Beach to answer other calls in that town during the incident, Knight said.
Because the wind was blowing west, it protected the Vista Plaza Business Center located behind the two destroyed businesses. But the fire spread across Kings Highway into several trees at the entrance of Ocean Breeze Plantation and singed grass in the median, authorities said.
“It was blowing in our favor. We had a large volume fire in a very old building. We had our hands full when we got here,” Knight said.
It was unclear what caused the fire, and investigators were at the scene Thursday evening looking at the beachwear store near the entrance of the building, where the fire was believed to have started, Knight said. It may take a while to determine the cause because of the intensity of the blaze, he said.
“When you have this much damage, it’s tough to determine cause and origin,” Knight said.
About 2,900 people lost power for more than an hour while repair crews worked to reroute power, said Santee Cooper spokeswoman Molly Gore. Gore said at 4:45 p.m. that about 100 people were still without power, but she expected that power would be fully restored by evening.
Several people were without cable and telephone connections at 7:30 p.m. as emergency crews worked to reroute those lines as well.
Owners of the beachwear store could not be reached Thursday evening for comment.
Fairchild said her family has owned the ice cream business in that same location for 19 years. The business employed eight people and was to remain open until Nov. 1, when it would have closed for the season, she said.
“I’m very sad because it is a family business. I don’t know what the future holds now,” Fairchild said.
Many area residents walked up to the businesses to snap photos of the blaze with their cell phones, while
West Coast 911 firefighting news source - The Sun News - Myrtle Beach FL
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