Cause of Brost's Fashions blaze still unknown

Businesses in downtown Brookings begin process of cleaning up

By Mondell Keck

The Brookings Register

Posted 1/3/25

BROOKINGS — The blaze that destroyed Brost’s Fashions and damaged several other businesses in downtown Brookings on Monday morning started in the store’s basement, Brookings Fire …

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Cause of Brost's Fashions blaze still unknown

Businesses in downtown Brookings begin process of cleaning up

Posted

BROOKINGS — The blaze that destroyed Brost’s Fashions and damaged several other businesses in downtown Brookings on Monday morning started in the store’s basement, Brookings Fire Chief Pete Bolzer said Thursday.

“It was probably one of the nastiest, most contrary fires I’ve ever fought in 45 years,” he said. “The fire wasn’t what it appeared to be. It didn’t behave the way we expected it to behave, and it seemed like we were behind the eight ball constantly.”

In addition to Brookings, fire departments from Volga, Ramona and Madison also assisted during and after the flames were extinguished. As for the fire’s cause, that has yet to be determined.

“The investigation is still continuing. There’s some other investigators that wanted to be involved and they showed up this morning,” Bolzer told the Brookings Register. “There’s a lot of stuff we need to go through yet. I would say a report won’t even be considered until next week some time.”

He added that there were some minor injuries among the firefighters.

“A few firefighters had some minor injuries because of slipping on the ice and then overexertion,” Bolzer said. “We had a couple of them that were suffering from dehydration.”

Cleanup is now underway at the site at 318 Main Ave. Bolzer said four apartments were destroyed in the fire, and that other units sustained smoke damage and were rendered at least temporarily uninhabitable. According to Downtown Brookings Executive Director Kirsten Gjesdal, a total of 12 apartments were impacted, affecting an estimated 18 people.

The fire’s origin in the basement is why Bolzer described it as nasty and contrary.

“Right then and there you’re dealing with circumstances that you don’t want to be dealing with, because you’re going to be fighting the hottest part of the fire,” he said. “Because of that, it was just spreading in weird fashions — popping up here, popping up there. We were always just reacting to it.

“We never could mount a really good offensive attack on the fire because of where it was located and having to react to it rather than the other way around,” he continued. “We prefer to figure out where the fire is, what it’s going to do, where it’s going and things like that, and then we take it on on our terms.”

He finished, “This is a fire that was very contrary and we basically had to address the fire on its terms, which the ending is never good when you do that.”

He said the blaze, once it had access to enough oxygen, came up out of the basement up the stairs and in some other areas in an extremely fast fashion and very hot state.

“We were basically forced to fall back and use defensive operations,” Bolzer said.

In the end, though, firefighters triumphed and managed to keep the fire from spreading beyond Brost’s Fashions.

“Even with everything that was thrown against the department, I just can’t say enough about how well the firefighters performed,” Bolzer said. “Given the situation that we were in, we could have lost four to five buildings very easily. Those guys busted their butts to ensure that didn’t happen.”

He finished, “It’s a testament to their work and their training.”

Bolzer said firefighters were on site for 28 hours — basically from 5 a.m. Monday to noon Tuesday. He didn’t leave until early in the afternoon Tuesday.

Ripple effect

Gjesdal said 18 businesses were affected by the fire.

“(They) have had something of which the fire has affected their ability to run their business, whether that’s smoke, water, actual fire damage,” she said. “Obviously, some have had it much worse than others.”

That included Seven Songbirds Boutique.

“It suffered a partial floor and roof collapse,” Bolzer said. “There’s some major structural damage to that building.”

He said the damage resulted from a combination of the fire and the efforts to battle it.

“Both of them combined together resulted in that,” Bolzer said. “The fire had transferred into that building through some connecting openings. Because of the effects of the fire and then the added weight of the water being used, it led to those collapses.”

Other businesses that endured damage — and whose reopening dates are still mostly uncertain — were The Ugly Duckling at 312 Main Ave. north through Rejuvenation Med Spa at 324 Main Ave. Other businesses in that stretch include those in the Grunewaldt Building at 314 Main Ave., the aforementioned Seven Songbirds Boutique, 320 Main Ave., and The Exchange, 322 Main Ave.

The Grunewaldt Building is home, according to owner Kevin Grunewaldt, to Johnson & Richter Creative, The Nook Bookstore, Emerald Grace Clothing Co., Prairie Soul Studio, Limestone Bookkeeping, Hand Tied Floral and Estheva Spa Therapies.

Grunewaldt noted that the city has placed a condemned notice on his building — but that doesn’t mean it’s going to be demolished. An engineering inspection is slated for Monday, he added.

“It’s more of a safety precaution and city policy … until the right authorities come and take a look at it, meaning a structural engineer to see if my wall is compromised,” he said. “Right now, we’re unsure of the structural stability because of the heat and the water exposure to it. So until that’s done, they’re kind of just having everything on hold. So that’s where we sit.”

Grunewaldt added, “Not that the building’s coming down — we’re just waiting to have the right individuals come in and analyze it.”

Meanwhile, The Carrot Seed at 310 Main Ave., which Gjesdal owns, plans to reopen Tuesday. She added that Wild Child Boutique, 326 Main Ave., should also be able to reopen soon, but didn’t have more specific information than that.

Helping tenants

Tenants whose lives were upended by fire have also received assistance in the days following the blaze.

Gjesdal said contact information has been collected from them, and that the Brookings Behavioral Health and Wellness at 211 Fourth St. has reached out to them to help with immediate and future needs.

“At this point, they have all been taken care of for immediate needs — a warm place to stay and that sort of thing,” she said. “The next steps are helping them with long term … new living arrangements, helping them get there, and then helping to replace some of those bigger ticket items that they may have lost — couches, beds, that sort of thing.”

Fundraising plans

Gjesdal said Wooden Legs, 309 Fifth St., is having a trivia event on Tuesday whose fundraising is specifically targeted at downtown Brookings. It starts at 7:30 p.m. Gjesdal said other fundraising efforts are also underway, including one by a business owner who’s making collection/change jars to distribute around downtown.

“So if people have extra cash, they can just stuff it in one of the jars and that will go to help the businesses,” she said.

Other efforts that are being considered include a “percent of proceeds” event at local restaurants and seeing if there are grant and/or low-interest loan options available from economic development partners.

Gjesdal also encouraged anyone who’s interested in doing a benefit, a silent auction or similar effort to assist businesses to let Downtown Brookings know.

“We’re all ears for ideas and can help promote those,” she said. “The more people we can have help and assist with something like that, the better. … Having people that can kind of own the process of running some of those events and things would be very helpful to us.”

In closing, she said the road ahead is going to be a long one.

“When a tragedy like this happens … everyone wants to jump in and help right away, and I think a lot of the things that people will end up needing help with aren’t things that are needed right away,” Gjesdal said. “So continuing to think of the people and the businesses that have been affected by this and know that some of their needs might be coming six months down the road. It’s a long journey, and support and encouragement will be needed for a long time.”

— Contact Mondell Keck at mkeck@brookingsregister.com.