By JAMES SPEAR
A building fire near the I-15 Orem Center Street exit caused over $500,000 in property and structure damages and put the building's three businesses out on the street.
The fire began Tuesday morning around 9 a.m. in Best Price Kids Store.
Larry Sirkel, owner of the children's clothing store, does not know what caused the fire.
Sirkel was preparing to take several boxes of children's clothing to American Fork when he realized the store was burning. He ran to the business next door to warn them about the fire.
The smoke alarm had already gone off at Quantum Leap, a computer network company. Larry 'Chief' Lires, president of Quantum Leap, was inside when the smoke alarm was set off. Lires and several others grabbed fire extinguishers and entered Best Price Kids Store hoping to put out the fire.
'One of our guys knocked the fire wall down, and we thought we had the thing put out,' Lires said. 'But our fire extinguishers ran out and the fire started back up.'
Both Quantum Leap and the third business in the building, Les Olson Company, sustained heavy smoke damage.
Tom Olson, head of operations for Les Olson Company, an office equipment store, estimated at least $125,000 in property damages for their company alone.
'Between 50 and 60 percent of our inventory is lost,' Olson said of his office supply company.
'We're going to have to take each machine apart to clean it,' he said as he opened a copy machine revealing heavy soot.
Of the three companies, Les Olson Company was the furthest away from the fire's origin and sustained the least amount of damage.
The structure of the building's roof was ruined by heat. All three companies will have to move out until the entire roof can be replaced, Olson said.