Ogden fire chief says that recent structure fires are not connected

OGDEN, Utah (ABC4) — After five major structure fires in Ogden in recent weeks, the Ogden Fire Department is saying that they are not connected to each other.

Mike Slater, Ogden Fire Chief told ABC4.com that while structure fires are always a concern, the fires are not related to each other.

“When we look at the fires, some of them are electrical issues,” he said. “The one we had just the other day was improper disposal of smoking products, and they’re in different areas of the city, so no, they’re not necessarily tied together.”

June, July, and August are typically fire season, when there are the most fires compared to the rest of the year, but this year has been even busier than normal, Slater said.

One recent apartment fire in Ogden caused over $1 million in damages and displaced 13 people. Another structure fire burned a townhome and caused $1.6 million in damages. Another fire destroyed an apartment building that was still under construction.

“Not just in Ogden, but across the state,” he said. “You know, you saw what happened up in Weber County with that fire, and West Jordan had some fires, Salt Lake had a big fire, Provo’s got that big grass fire, so it’s just been a busy year for the fire services across the state of Utah.”

It’s been an active season for wildfires, and structure fires pose a different threat. “Every structure fire is a concern for us because somebody is affected by that, whether it’s a resident, a property owner,” Slater said.

“The apartment fire was concerning because it was a new construction building that’s gone up, and we’ve had two of those happen this year, so we’re investigating it, and we’re doing everything we can to find what the cause of that fire was, and if it was human caused, who that individual was,” he said.

Two of the properties that have caught on fire were owned by Lotus Construction, Slater said, but he doesn’t “pay credence to a lot of the rumors that go around there.”

He added that Lotus has been fantastic to work with when the fire department asked them to secure their properties. “They got right on it. They’ve done a fantastic job to help us.”

In addition to Lotus Construction, Slater said that they’ve talked to 50 contractors throughout the city who are constructing homes and apartments, and they also asked them to secure their sites. “They don’t want to lose their property. They put a lot of time, money, and effort into these things, to see them go up in flame is just tragic.”

“The community is safe,” Slater said. “Our fire department’s responding and they’re doing a fantastic job when these fires happen, to put them out, and we’re being proactive with the builders in the city to make sure that their sites are secure.”

The majority of the buildings where fires have occurred have been occupied, not abandoned or empty.