By 5:15 p.m. on Sept. 21, just 15 minutes after Dynaco officially reopened, the room was already half full. By 5:45, it was packed — and stayed that way until last call.

For Adam Forgash, co-owner of the 13-year-old bar with his brother Ben, the scene was a long-awaited one.

“It was extraordinary,” he told Brooklyn Paper.

Dynaco reopened Monday after a January fire forced the beloved watering hole to close its doors. The fire did not directly reach the bar, but smoke and water damage, along with a building-wide vacate order, left the business unable to operate.

The months that followed were filled with insurance headaches, construction and uncertainty over when the bar could return.

“The waiting was the worst part,” Forgash said. “Waiting for the insurance company was very rough. We didn’t know what was going to happen.”

Because Dynaco operated out of a building the brothers do not own, the rebuilding process depended in part on the landlord’s insurance company. For a time, the landlord was considering adding another floor to the building, which Forgash said could have made an already lengthy process even longer.

The fire that forced the bar to close its doors in January, beginning the months-long road back to reopening.Photo courtesy of Dynaco

That plan was ultimately denied because the landlord did not have the necessary rights, Forgash said. The landlord then brought in an architect and contractors who helped move the project forward.

“They were so fast and communicative,” Forgash said. “So we felt like we were in good hands.”

One of the biggest hurdles was getting the building’s full vacate order converted into a partial vacate order. That would allow Dynaco to operate on the ground floor and in the cellar while construction continued elsewhere in the building.

That required several safety improvements, including roof repairs and enclosing the building’s staircase in fireproof materials. Once those requirements were met, the Department of Buildings could inspect the property.

About two weeks before Dynaco reopened, that inspection process finally converted the full vacate order being converted into a partial one.

“We had everything ready to go and we were just waiting for what I just said, the vacate order to be turned into a partial vacate order, and that’s what happened about two weeks ago,” Forgash said.

The Dynaco team then finished preparing the bar itself, repairing equipment and floors, having the space professionally cleaned by a flood and fire remediation company and replacing its stock.

The vacate order posted at the building after a January fire forced the Bed-Stuy bar to close for months.Photo courtesy of Dynaco

But there was another piece of the rebuilding process that meant just as much to Forgash: rebuilding the staff.

Nearly the entire team that worked at Dynaco before the fire came back.

“All but one of the bartenders that we had before the fire came back to us,” Forgash said.

The bartender who did not return, he said, found a job in the field she had been most interested in pursuing.

“She got an amazing job in a field that was her primary interest, and it was completely understandable,” Forgash said. “She landed a great job.”

The returning staff was such an important part of the bar’s return that the brothers took them out to dinner a few days before reopening.

It was also the staff who encouraged the brothers not to make the reopening a quiet one.

At first, Forgash and his brother considered simply unlocking the doors and seeing what happened — the same way they approached opening Dynaco 13 years ago.

“We just opened the doors,” Forgash said. “We didn’t hire PR or we didn’t talk to any press. We just opened the doors.”

But this time, they posted the news on Instagram the night before.

By 4:50 p.m. Monday, people were already waiting outside.

“And we opened the door. The door, I guess, was unlocked, and they pushed it open,” Forgash said. “And again, by 5:15, the place was half full, and by, you know, quarter to 6:00, it was completely full, and it just stayed that way till closing.”

Forgash said the night may have been the busiest in the bar’s history.

“I think it might have been the busiest night ever,” he said.

The packed reopening was a fitting response from a neighborhood that had rallied around Dynaco since the fire.

After the blaze, the community supported the bar through a GoFundMe campaign, a raffle and a fundraising event. Local businesses and individuals donated to the effort, including Pilates and yoga instructors, according to Forgash.

“It seems like everyone in the neighborhood and beyond [has supported us],” he said.

The bar opened on Sept. 21, and Forgash said it was one of its busiest days ever.Photo courtesy of Dynaco

That support helped carry the bar through months when its future was uncertain.

Now, after months of waiting, rebuilding and wondering when the doors would open again, Dynaco is back where its owners wanted it all along: behind the bar, surrounded by the Bed-Stuy community that refused to let it disappear quietly.

“It’s been really emotional,” Forgash said. “I mean, the whole thing has been so emotional.”