On Tuesday August 27th around 12:44 pm the Grass Valley / Nevada City Fire Department responded to a 911 call of smoke coming from the roof of the Everhart Hotel, located at the corner of West Main Street and South Church Street in Grass Valley, Ca. Upon the arrival of the first Engine Company, they reported smoke coming from the 4th floor of the building with fire on the roof.
Crews went into rescue mode and began assisting residents from the building including rescuing 4 residents, while other crews arrived and made an aggressive fire attack. Crews were able to contain the fire to the mechanical room on the roof and the apartment directly below the fire.
In total 14 engines, 2 trucks , 2 squads and 4 Chief Officers responded to the incident from multiple agencies including the City of Grass Valley / Nevada City Fire Department, Nevada County Consolidated, Ophir Hill, Peardale, Penn Valley, Cal Fire, and the City of Marysville.
In addition to the fire response our partners at Grass Valley Police department and Nevada County Sheriff’s Office all assisted with traffic control and evacuations. Sierra Nevada Ambulance was on scene assisting with medical care. Two firefighters were transported to the hospital for medical evaluation and were released shortly after.
The building suffered heavy fire damage to the mechanical room on the roof, the roof itself, and a vacant apartment directly below the mechanical room.
At the time of the fire there were 10 apartments and 13 occupants in the building. The building was turned back over to the owner who is currently working with the city on developing the plan moving forward.
The building was red tagged, meaning that it can’t be occupied, this was done because PG&E had to pull the power meter to secure electricity to the building.
The investigation into what started the fire has been completed and the area of origin was determined to be the mechanical room on the roof. However the exact cause of the fire was undetermined due to the amount of heat and fire that was in the room of origin upon the fire departments arrival.