Waking to the Sound of Fire Truck Sirens

It's Sunday morning and before the sun came up I woke up to the sound of fire truck sirens. Not just passing by, but sitting near my front door blaring away. I could hear some people yelling and then 2 car alarms began going off. I could tell they were trying to wake people up.

With all of that, I didn't smell smoke. It's about 4 hours since I woke up and upon going outside I saw that the red brick building in the picture, which is on the same side of the street as me, in the other block, is burning. I noticed people standing behind my house looking at something and I walked back there to see another house on fire.

I talked to my neighbor, Mary who seems to know everything, and she said that there were a total of 4 buildings on fire. The bottom floors of the buildings housed businesses, a children's art school, a laundry mat, a hair salon and an attorney's office. The top floors are residential. Mary informed me that no one was injured.

The wild thing... is that with all the fires that I have lived through in California.. never has one been so close to where I live. I think that is wild.

For some reason I didn't hear the siren that blares through the streets to wake up the volunteer fire department. I just heard the fire truck sirens.

I am really not 100% surprised by the fire. These old buildings have very old wiring. Something that people aren't required to get updated and replaced.

Ciao