Fire Destroys Lincoln City Seafood Market
A fast-moving fire destroyed the Crab Pot seafood market Thursday afternoon. About 30 firefighters battled the blaze, which closed Highway 101 for two and half hours and backed detouring traffic up for several miles in both directions. (Photo by Larry Coonrod)
By Larry Coonrod
LINCOLN CITY—After 40-years in business, the end came quickly Thursday for Allen Black’s Crab Pot seafood market Highway 101 and SW 60th Street just south of Schooner Creek.
Black stepped away from the smoker in the back of the building where he says he had been preparing halibut and salmon. He returned a few minutes later to find flames leaping up the walls.
“I’ve been smoking fish here for almost 40 years, and that’s never happened before,” he said while watching firefighters mop up the smoldering remains of the business Thursday afternoon.
Black escaped the building unharmed and called 9-1-1 after the fire broke out a few minutes before 3 p.m., but arriving firefighters could do little to save the 80 -year-old wooden structure. Lincoln City Public Affairs and Safety Officer Jim Kusz was the first on the scene.
“When I arrived we had heavy smoke coming out of the front end of the building, and I called a second alarm for a fully involved structure fire,” he said.
Twenty-four North Lincoln Fire personnel responded with two aerial ladder trucks, three engines, and an additional rehab and rescue vehicle. The Depoe Bay Fire District sent an engine and crew to assist in extinguishing the flames. An engine from the Nestucca Fire District moved an engine to Lincoln City to cover any additional emergency calls.
Highway 101 Closed
The fire occurred at the start of the Fourth of July holiday and the road closure backed traffic up for several miles. A heavy cloud of gray smoked pushed south by the wind obscured visibility and forced some passing motorists on Highway 101 to pull over. Authorities closed the Highway shortly after 3 p.m. to make room for fire vehicles and routed passenger vehicles east via Drift Creek and 48th Street.
A semi-truck attempting to use the narrow bypass roads became high centered and slowed the detouring traffic. Semi-trucks and RVs waited alongside the highway until almost 5:30 p.m. before police reopened the road.
Building a Complete Loss
Kusz said investigators plan to probe the wreckage to determine exactly how the blaze started.
“We believe the fire started in the backroom and quickly spread to the south side,” Kusz said. “Within a matter of 20 or 30 minutes, the roof collapsed.”
The fire department brought in an excavator to knock down or “implode” what remained of the structure after the flames were out.
Home Lost
Black lived in a four-bedroom house attached to the market, also destroyed by the fire. Stunned neighbors tried to comfort Black and offered whatever assistance they could.
“My wife and I put the earnest money down on the place in the fall of 1974,” Black said.
Watching an excavator tear down what was left of his life work, Black was unsure if he would rebuild the business.
"I'm about to turn 68 years old,” he said. “The likelihood that I'm going to rebuild it is not great, but it was my livelihood, and I'm not retired.”
Contact reporter Larry Coonrod by emailing editor@lincolncountydispatch.com
