Lake Placid fire victims begin picking up pieces

July 27--LAKE PLACID -- Mopping up, sorting ruined merchandise from good and salvaging what they could, business owners and residents picked through the fire-damaged pieces here Monday.

The Meyer building fire displaced about 16 people from apartments in that and adjacent Wanda building.

All have been temporarily relocated, and many have friends and family in town or close by.

Tyler and Natasha Rand lived on the top floor of the Wanda building.

On Monday, he moved unburned furnishings down two flights of stairs with help from his brother, Owen.

"This was the spare room," Tyler said of the once cozy space that overlooks Mirror Lake.

Charred sills framed the broken glass, and scorched asphalt tiles and sodden fabrics littered the hardwood floor.

He was moving what they could save into storage.

Helping, too, was Andy Seligman, who lives just across the hall.

No fire made it that far, he said, expressing gratitude for the firefighters.

"I lucked out; you're talking 6 feet away," Seligman said.

"This is a tragedy that has pulled us together as a community. That's when you realize your community is your family."

'GRABBED OUR STUFF'

Two floors below, Two Harts boutique remained closed, with insurance adjustors and electricians at work, assessing damage, beginning repairs.

Store owner Jane Goff was busy talking with them.

"We heard a fire alarm from inside," said store manager Amy Hajrulla, who was at work when the fire alarms sounded.

"When we looked down the alleyway, we saw flames. We grabbed our personal stuff, the money and locked up. Then we sat across the street and watched the fire, terrified."

The narrow "alley" is maybe a few feet wide, now littered with blackened debris, scarred roofing and ashes from the Meyer building.

Glass and blackened debris cover much of the back lawns of these buildings and the others two doors down.

"They shot water from the sides, and it all trickled down," Hajrulla said.

Two apartments sit underneath the storefront level, and residents there were displaced, Hajrulla said.

'WELL DONE, LAKE PLACID'

But she also watched heroics Saturday as a firefighter climbed up a ladder to a window in the second-floor apartments next door and twice came down with a cat.

As she spoke, she politely turned away customers wanting to go into the clothing boutique with its window display still fresh and vibrant.

"We are closed right now," she said about a half dozen times in 20 minutes.

Debbie and Marek Plachecki, who came from Cornwall, Ontario, to watch their son compete in the Ironman, offered her words of kindness.

"We were really impressed with the fire response from all the small towns," Mr. Plachecki said.

"I was worried that we wouldn't be able to shop," Mrs. Plachecki said. "But we did shop. We're back shopping today. This was a fun and relaxing visit, despite the fire."

"Well done, Lake Placid," Mr. Plachecki said. "We'll be back."

WATER DAMAGE

Mark "Willie" Wilcox owns the building just north of the Meyer building and runs the Summer Antiques store there.

He pointed to cracks in the ceilings and apparent water damage along the floor, where the wall to his building abuts the heavily damaged Meyer building.

"The water seeped through this wall, and it's all in the electrical heating," Wilcox said.

He lives in an apartment just below the store, which drops two and a half stories down with the slope toward the lake.

He was able to get downstairs about midnight Saturday to save his personal photographs.

"All of my clothes are soaked; I've worn this shirt for three days straight," Wilcox said of the aftermath, working the phones as he waited for the insurance adjustor.

Wilcox hoped to resume normal business hours soon.

SMOKE AND SOOT

At Goose Watch wine-tasting boutique, manager Elsa Moscato moved at hyper speed, pulling soggy cardboard boxes out of the back rooms.

The wine-tasting bar is on the first floor of the Wanda building. With the place cleaned, she reopened at about 1:30 p.m. Monday.

Newman's News reopened Sunday at its location in the northern edge of the Wanda building.

Andrew Lynch, a cashier at the news shop, wasn't working Saturday night but watched as fire licked ever closer to their building.

"It was a lot of water pouring down, and still smoking. With everything else, out of all weekends to happen, you know? And I love working at Newman's News."

The building one door north of Wilcox's place is home to Imagination Station, which reopened when fire officials gave the all clear.

Sally and Bob Crowley own the building, and though it escaped fire damage, their waterfront apartment below the store was marred with smoke and soot.

"We were at 5:30 p.m. Mass at St. Agnes," Mrs. Crowley explained.

"When we got out of church, one of our friends told us the building was on fire. At first we thought it was this one."

The Crowleys raced home through dense traffic on Main Street to find their building, which has three other units, was evacuated.

Everyone there has managed to return home.

RECENT FIRE DRILL

But the brick edifice of the Meyer building looms three stories large about 30 feet from the Crowleys' backyard.

"It's badly damaged; you just don't know," she said, looking up from their back deck.

Mrs. Crowley donned bright yellow cleaning gloves as she swept away the cinders and charred pieces of roof and wood.

"Father John (Yonkovig) at St. Agnes (Church) came with a group of boys and cleaned up the backyard," she said.

The Crowleys are friends with Mary Ann Hawley, who owns the Meyer building.

"She had trained her staff what to do in case of fire," Mrs. Crowley said. "They had a fire drill last week."

The lost hours will be a factor for the closed businesses.

But retailers and residents alike were grateful that the fire was kept to one building in the tightly framed Main Street row.

"Today is a huge retail day," Mrs. Crowley said.

"But it shows you what the community is like -- they pulled off Ironman."

Email Kim Smith Dedam:

kdedam@pressrepublican.com

Twitter: @KimDedam

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