An entire block of business suffered damage in a fire Monday afternoon in Elizabethtown. Seven destroyed, two others badly damaged. Some owners tried to get their belongings out, but the fire just spread too fast. They had to leave their businesses, escaping from the flames themselves, but now all they can do is console each other.
"It all just happened too fast. He says he couldn't take out anything, it was just so quick," one owner said. When the fire started, the owners of the Hispanic grocery store tried to use a fire extinguisher to put out the flames, but the blaze grew out of control too fast.
Andrew Gatica's business is just a few doors down, they want to re-build, but it will be from the ground-up. "We were the only Hispanic corner in Bladen County and it's all gone, just in a few minutes," he said.
At the end of the row, Bladen Tire Company. Firefighters stopped the fire before it did any major damage.
"My main thoughts were, what am I going to do? What can I save, you know, what's going to happen?" Powell could only stand back and watch, something hard for him because he's also a member of the Elizabethtown Fire Department.
"I just feel fortunate, I'm glad that everybody helped. Nobody's hurt, glad of that. I just appreciate everything that everybody has done," Cross said.
The owner of the property isn't sure what he's going to do with the land. He says first he has to figure out how much insurance will cover and go from there.
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