Five-alarm fire consumes unfinished northside luxury apartment complex

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OKLAHOMA CITY (Free Press) — A massive luxury apartment complex on the north side went up in flames Tuesday night from a rare five-alarm fire. It was unoccupied and there were no injuries.

Because of roofing materials used on the building, firefighters had a hard time extinguishing the fire that continued burning even with water being poured on.

Update: As of 6:30 a.m. Wednesday, flames could be seen still burning within the core of two parts of the building. Fire officials have no estimate of when the fire will be completely extinguished because of the rubberized material from the roof.

The Canton at Classen Curve, 1100 NW 63rd in Oklahoma City, is a new five-story apartment project nearing completion but not yet occupied. The company was in the leasing process writing contracts for apartments ranging from $1,100 per month all the way up to $4,000 per month.

The complex sits on the south side of NW 63rd which puts it in the city limits of Oklahoma City. However, it is across the street from Nichols Hills, a small city with a disproportionately large percentage of wealthy residents surrounded mostly by Oklahoma City and The Village. The marketing website for the complex refers to its being in Nichols Hills.

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The west side of The Canton at Classen Curve apartment complex continues to burn even though firefighters were dumping large amounts of water onto the blaze. (BRETT DICKERSON/Okla City Free Press)

Defensive posture

Oklahoma City Fire Department Battalion Chief Benny Fulkerson said that they first started responding to the fire around 6:30 p.m. They tried to attack the fire at first with crews on the inside and outside but then changed tactics to a defensive posture, meaning that they would work outside to keep the fire from spreading but would no longer have crews inside.

Firefighters found that the rubber-like material that was used on the roof to seal it from wet weather continued to burn even with water being applied.

Aerial shots of the building showed that most of the complex was in flames.

Fulkerson said that they were limited in where they could deploy their equipment because only about half of the perimeter had paved parking. The rest was still so muddy from recent snows that they could not get any of their ladder trucks or engines deployed on the north and east sides.

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The double-snorkel bucket of one of the ladder companies seems to hang in the air as white smoke and a stream of water from the ground intermingle. (BRETT DICKERSON/Okla City Free Press)

80 firefighters

The fire was so massive that OKCFD eventually had 80 firefighters on the location. Fulkerson said that the duration and strength of the fire meant that they rotated crews to give firefighters some rest and recovery time before going back to fighting fires.

But, Free Press witnessed a fire crew that was supposed to be resting standing and looking seemingly eager to get back in the fight.

Officials did not name a cause for the fire.

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One crew rotated out for rest during the long firefighting operation look at the operations going on at The Canton at Classen Curve. (BRETT DICKERSON/Okla City Free Press)

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Founder, publisher, and editor of Oklahoma City Free Press. Brett continues to contribute reports and photography to this site as he runs the business.