PRESS RELEASE
To: NEWSROOM
For Immediate Release

March 7 - Fires destroy MLK home and vacant Allendale business

Two fires that were reported only minutes apart in different areas of Shreveport destroyed a home in the Martin Luther King neighborhood and a vacant business in Allendale . . .

Shreveport firefighters were first dispatched to 3034 Gordonia Street where they found a residence heavily involved in flames. The fire was called in at 11:27 a.m. and it took firefighters more than 45 minutes to bring the blaze under control but not before it destroying a large portion of the single story wood-frame home. Shatarie Pierce, 29, told fire investigators that she was asleep when the fire started and awoke to find the room full of smoke. Pierce and her two small children, ages two and three, were able to escape with no injuries. Investigators are focusing their attention to an area around a television in the room of the fire’s origin and where one of the children, who had access to a lighter, may have started the fire.

The second fire, reported at 11:39 a.m. was on the corner of Sprague and Lawrence Street. Heavy black smoke could be seen for miles as flames broke through the roof of a vacant business in the Allendale neighborhood. When firefighters arrived they had to battle not just heavy smoke and flames but a strong easterly wind that was pushing the fire and its embers westward. Christian Services had three large buildings directly across the street from the blaze but firefighters were able to hold the fire at bay and away from all other structures. However, the embers did start a small grass fire on a vacant lot cattycornered to the fire. It took more than half a dozen pieces of equipment and 20 firefighters to bring the fire under control around 12:15 p.m. No injures were reported and fire investigators are following up on information that individuals often came and went from the building, using it as a possible shelter or for illegal activity. The building has no utilities. No injuries were reported. ###