A firefighter was injured early Wednesday after falling through a floor while battling a smoky three-alarm fire that erupted in a San Francisco office building on the busy Market Street corridor.
Lt. Ken Smith did not know the condition of the firefighter -- who fell from the first floor into the basement. He was taken to a San Francisco General Hospital for treatment.
Smith said the blaze was fire reported around 6 a.m. and because of the location was quickly elevated to a three-alarm blaze. When firefighters arrived, they found heavy smoke pouring out of the building on both Market St. and on Stevenson in the rear.
"It (poses) a challenge for us," Smith said. "We have smoke coming out both on Market and Stevenson so we have to attack the fire from both the front and the back. In doing so, we are pushing the fire back on each other. So there has to be a lot of coordination."
Smith said the fire was very smoky so it was hard to pinpoint where the blaze was in the building that was under construction.
"It's a concrete building, that's abandoned and has construction going on," he said. "That makes it very difficult."
Authorities had shutdown Market St. between Van Ness and 9th Street.
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