UPPER DARBY, Pa. (WPVI) — Crews continued to work early Wednesday morning in hopes of getting several businesses back open after a Delaware County strip mall fire.<\/p>\n
Officials said Tuesday they are concerned about the structural integrity of the store where the fire began.<\/p>\n
The fire started around 5:45 p.m. Monday in the Payless Shoe Source store, located on the unit block of 69th Street in Upper Darby.<\/p>\n
200 firefighters and emergency workers were called in to battle the flames. With Upper Darby Fire Department leading the way, they tried to make entry, but couldn’t.<\/p>\n
Minutes later, the roof collapsed.<\/p>\n
Crews worked to contain the fire to the Payless store. However, seven neighboring stores have been affected due to heat, smoke, or water damaged.<\/p>\n
After a few hours, firefighters were able to get the upper hand on the blaze just before 9:00 p.m. without any further injuries.<\/p>\n
Now engineers will have to inspect the building, and likely tear down an unstable back wall before investigators can step inside to look for a cause of the blaze.<\/p>\n
Upper Darby Fire Chief Edward Cubler explains, “The back wall is too unstable. We have things still dropping, falling … So, until we can stabilize that, nobody is getting in the building.”<\/p>\n
As of right now, much of Upper Darby’s 69th Street commercial core, the shops between Ludlow and Chestnut, remain closed.<\/p>\n
Employees of some of the stores were allowed inside Tuesday to assess the situation.<\/p>\n
The decision to keep the block shuttered is based in part on safety.<\/p>\n
Chief Cubler tells us, “We’re going to be bringing construction equipment in. We’re going to be doing things that we don’t … We have a day care down the street. There’s no way I would have little children around with equipment. Something could go afoul, and there’s absolutely no way we would allow that to happen.”<\/p>\n
In addition, most of the block remains without electricity. PECO is redirecting power, but it could take a while for any stores to reopen.<\/p>\n
However, crews were back out early Wednesday in an effort to get the stores back open.<\/p>\n
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