Searching for the Cause of Devastating Five Alarm New Jersey Mosque Fire

Dozens of fire crews battled a five alarm fire in Elizabeth. Now investigators will try to learn just what ignited the flames that devastated the largest mosque in that city. Cynthia Guaba reports.

Investigators are inside the mosque Monday morning, a building that has been the center of a community but now is gone.

For the 600 people who pray here on a Friday night, the fire is a disaster. It undoes years of work, and a community's effort to rebuild the century old structure and open a school within the mosque this fall.

The five alarm fire got started just after 7:00pm Sunday. It was quick and intense, and once it got a hold on the mosque it kept burning.

It took fire units from 20 surrounding communities more than three hours to get the flames under control. Even as they sprayed water on the mosque, the intense heat of the fire ate through the upper support beams. That set off a collapse, with the roof giving way.

Parts of the third floor and second floor also collapsed, but it seems the structure, built early in this century, may have been built well enough to survive event this.

There were no serious injuries reported in this fire.