{"id":256743,"date":"2026-05-03T16:36:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-03T16:36:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/256743\/"},"modified":"2026-05-03T16:36:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-03T16:36:12","slug":"massive-fire-destroys-university-of-south-florida-laboratory-building-total-loss-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/256743\/","title":{"rendered":"Massive fire destroys University of South Florida laboratory building: \u2018Total loss\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A massive fire broke out Saturday afternoon at a laboratory building on the University of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/category\/us\/us-regions\/southeast\/florida\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">South Florida<\/a> campus in St. Petersburg, authorities said.<\/p>\n<p>Campus police said fire crews were called to the Marine Science Laboratory building for a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/category\/fires\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">structure fire<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>No injuries have been reported, and the building was safely evacuated, police said.<\/p>\n<p>The cause of the fire is under investigation.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/travel\/lightning-strike-turns-100-foot-dinosaur-raging-fireball-stunned-park-visitors-look\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">LIGHTNING STRIKE TURNS 100-FOOT DINOSAUR INTO RAGING FIREBALL, STUNNING ONLOOKERS<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Large plumes of gray smoke were seen rising from the building late Saturday.<\/p>\n<p>According to the Tampa Bay Times, students and staff were alerted to the fire shortly before 6 p.m.<\/p>\n<p>The school sent an alert reading: \u201cUrgent Alert. Fire reported in MSL, Marine Science Lab. Evacuate building. Avoid area. Emergency personnel responding.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/us\/two-injured-explosion-rips-chemical-plant-sparking-hazmat-response-shelter-in-place-order\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">TWO INJURED AFTER EXPLOSION RIPS THROUGH CHEMICAL PLANT, SPARKING HAZMAT RESPONSE, SHELTER-IN-PLACE ORDER<\/a><\/p>\n<p>St. Petersburg Fire Chief Michael Lewis said more than 60 units and about 200 firefighters responded to the scene.<\/p>\n<p>Lewis said around 9 p.m. that the fire was largely extinguished but that the building is likely \u201ca total loss.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe entire roof has burned off,\u201d he said, according to the report.<\/p>\n<p>The University of South Florida said Saturday evening the building will remain closed until further notice.<\/p>\n<p>Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., reacted to news of the fire, calling it \u201cawful.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPlease join Anne and me in praying for everyone involved and affected,\u201d he wrote on X. \u201cThank God for our heroic first responders who run toward the danger at times like this.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/category\/us\/crime\/police-and-law-enforcement\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">USF police<\/a> said it will provide additional updates as more information becomes available.<\/p>\n<p>The Associated Press contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A massive fire broke out Saturday afternoon at a laboratory building on the University of South Florida campus&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":256744,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[202,204,203,199,201,200],"class_list":["post-256743","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256743","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=256743"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256743\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/256744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=256743"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=256743"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=256743"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}