I think it's good to kick this site off with an oldie but a goodie. Back in June of 2005 I witnessed one of the most unbelievable and devastating fires this city has ever seen. The Piquette Market Warehouse a.k.a. Studebaker A.C. and formerly known as the Wayne Automotive Company, was in its post centennial years at the time of the fire. Housing only four remaining business on the east end, the opposite side of the building was made entirely of brick and wood. Left vacant to rot and decay from the mid-70’s on, the once magnificent auto plant was merely a wooden shell of its former glory days, a tinderbox of epic proportions.

In early June of 2005 I was living in Milwaukee Junction area. It was around 10pm on a hot Monday night when it all began. The smell of smoke was nothing new; my apartment building had been the target of two fire bombings by former, disgruntled tenants in the past year. Taking a quick walk around the premises I noticed nothing out of the ordinary. I returned to my 3rd floor loft and turned on the TV. Every major local news channel was covering an out of control fire, reportedly on the west side of town. I sat and watched for a minute, and then decided to open a window to get some cool airflow going. Instead of a cool breeze I got a big whiff of noxious smoke. My apartment (on the east side) was so close to the fire I had a better view of it than Fox 2 news.

Without hesitation I grabbed my video camera and was out the door. I didn’t even need to drive. I was within walking distance of the largest single fire the New Center had ever seen. I met up with some friends from my apartment building. At first I admit I was panicked and worried, that was until the kegs of beer arrived. Now I have been witness to more than a few fires in the city at this point, but this had to be the first one with alcohol service. Our panic turned to curiosity, and then to excitement. As we drank and talked the crowd started to grow larger and larger, and by midnight the whole block was full of onlookers, delinquents, photographers, and the just plain’ old curious types.

I meet up with a couple friends from the northern suburbs; growing tired of trying to look over people, they convinced me to take them to the top of the Fisher Body 21. Another massive abandoned hunk of industrial might, discarded and left to deteriorate under its own enormous weight. With video rolling, we entered the disheveled entryway of FB21. Dodging dripping sulfur water, and carefully sidestepping large holes in the floor that run the entire length of the plant, we made it to the darkened stairway. The 8-floor climb to the top was made even more exhilarating by the sounds of sirens and light from the police cars outside on Piquette Street. Slowly emerging from out from the base of the large water tower we gazed upon the biggest inferno any of us had ever seen. The entire block was engulfed by this time. It almost caught the even larger warehouse directly next to it ablaze. A warehouse that Henry Ford built the first production model T’s in, before his assembly line in Highland Park was built. At the time of the fire, that warehouse contained 14 of the rarest automobiles in the world. If not for the amazing efforts of the DFD, that building too would have been lost, and thus most of the industrial warehousing district between Woodward and I-75, possibly even my own home.

Apparently while on the rooftop we had attracted the attention of the police helicopter. Likely with the use of heat signature cameras, they picked us out on top of the cold desolate building. In an instant we were under their scorching million-watt spotlight. Over a megaphone we could barely make out a voice instructing us to come out with hands up. Quickly we hurried inside the base of the water tower.

Out of sight we waited until the helicopter was gone before making our way back down. As the blaze continued we walked back to the scene of the now roaring crowd. With an atmosphere much like a rock concert, onlookers were on top of cars, busses and shoulders, all trying to get a better view of the carnage.

We proceeded to drink, talk, laugh, and tell stories until 4am. Firefighters tirelessly worked to control the blaze but it almost got the better of one fireman. Standing at the corner of Beaubien and Piquette, he was trying to drag a hose across the front of the building when the whole corner started to crumble. The Fireman jumped out of the way just as several hundred pounds of brick, and flaming timber came crashing to the ground where just moments before he had been standing. The crowds gasped in horror and then let out a giant simultaneous cheer. That firefighter survived certain death in front of an audience.

We finished the night off with a trip to the roof of my apartment. Continuing to watch the smoldering ruins of the auto facility become smoky soot, set a loft into the atmosphere only to be re-deposited over the already dingy industrial corridor. For weeks proceding the fire, you could see scrapers hard at work night and day trying to extrude the remaining copper, aluminum, and sheet metals that were still intact on the site of the old plant. I myself ventured by one night for some photos of the now leveled ruins of the Studebaker Plant. Unfortunately, I was not equipped at the time with a respirator mask and was over come quite quickly by the noxious odor of burned animal carcasses being stored there at the time of the fire.

At this current time the land sits much as it did a month after the fire with some initial clean up having already been done, but mounds of brick and steel still remain. Talks of GM purchasing the land to build a new research and development facility have been all but wiped away by Michigan’s poor economy and the prospect of negotiating with Detroit city counsel and their greedy business tactics. For now the future for the Piquette site is still unknown.