Fire Sweeps Through Historic Mason City Apartment Building, Help Sought for Victims

Fire has caused catastrophic damage to the historic Kirk Apartments in downtown Mason City.

Firefighters were called to the building at 1:30 Monday afternoon for a fire in a first-floor apartment and brought it under control about an hour later, but smoke and flames erupted from the building once again at about five o’clock.

Mason City Fire Chief Erik Bullinger says “It actually kind of flamed up as it got kind of a breath of fresh air, some fresh oxygen to it, and actually got between floors, so it was actually traveling throughout the building we assume, and it got to a point where it was actually getting into several other apartment. We then had to back crews out and start attacking the fire from the exterior doing a defensive fire attack.”

Bullinger added that it may be tough to quickly determine a cause since the fire spread and caused so much damage.  Due to the condition of the building, the fire chief questions whether a cause will ever be determined. 

At about 9:30 Monday night, fire crews were setting up lights and treating the building as a potential collapse zone.

The Kirk opened in 1903 as the city’s first luxury apartment building, originally supplying heat, light and water for the apartments with its own steam generating plant before being hooked into the city’s utility system. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1982 and is part of the downtown historic district in Mason City.

UPDATE: There is a Command Center for the 44 residents that were living in the Kirk Apartments downtown.  The Command Center is at the Mason City Salvation Army, 747 Village Drive, from 10 am to 3 pm this week. They are asking for Adult clothing, personal hygiene products, shoes, non-perishable food items, or monetary gifts.