GRAHAM, N.C. — Investigators said they believe the Culp Weaving Mill fire is "suspicious in nature" based on where it began.
Graham firefighters were called out to the three-alarm fire late Sunday night, and crews have been out there all day Monday, but the fire has been contained.
The fire forced temporary evacuations in the neighborhood. Rec Center manager Tel Fehohafer said about 5-6 families had come to the center for assistance. The evacuation shelter at the nearby rec center has since closed and neighbors are home.
No one has been hurt.
Graham Fire Chief Tommy Cole said it's still not safe for firefighters to go inside the old mill. For now, they're relying heavily on thermal imaging from drones to let them know where hot spots are. The threat of new sparks is keeping firefighters busy.
On Tuesday morning, the structure was aglow again after debris re-sparked, forcing firefighters to hose the wreckage. The hot spot was put out by 9:30 a.m.
Firefighters emphasize the fire remains contained.
An investigation is underway as to how it started.
Graham Mayor, Jennifer Talley theorized someone might have been trying to seek shelter in the partially-abandoned warehouse.
"It had just gotten cold and that I was I'm afraid that somebody went in there to get warm and fell asleep and left something burning in order to have some sort of heat source or something. That's what I'm mostly concerned about," said Talley
Another fire happened there just more than a year ago.
Officials said a couple of walls have collapsed and the building is considered a total loss.
Talley said, “It was very very scary because there were some firemen up on a ladder right over top of when that wall collapsed. When that wall collapsed, just a huge plume of embers and smoke and heat. You could feel the heat all the way over there and so just very dangerous for our firemen<"
Chief Cole said some homes surrounding the area have been evacuated in case more of the building collapses. Officers set up a temporary shelter at the Graham Recreation Center on College Street. Power has been restored to all the homes that had to be evacuated.
Chief Cole said the building was partially vacant and being used for storage.
"Anytime we have an abandoned, or vacant building it worries us. Especially like this, that’s not secured, we worry about maybe our homeless population being inside the building and maybe juveniles messing around inside the building. We believe this is probably a suspicious fire in nature, based on where it started, there’s really nothing else there without human intervention that would’ve started that fire," Chief Cole said.
"It was scary to see the flames. I've never seen something like that before," a resident told WFMY News 2 Monday morning.
Crews expect to be out there through Monday night into Tuesday.
Many departments across the Triad were helping with the fire.
Graham Fire is still putting out hot spots within the building.
Pictures from the Graham fire
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