WAVE 3 TV Louisville, KY | Big Four Bridge fire extinguished

Big Four Bridge fire extinguished

By Janelle MacDonald

LOUISVILLE (WAVE) -- If you were near downtown at lunchtime, you probably caught sight of smoke billowing from the waterfront. The Big Four Bridge caught fire sending lots of people out to watch. WAVE 3's Janelle MacDonald reports on the blaze that broke out just around 12:10 p.m. Tuesday.

It's not the first time the Big Four has caught fire. Chief Greg Frederick of Louisville Fire and Rescue says it happened more than ten years ago. That time, fire crews they climbed the bridge and got it out. This time, they were worried the old railroad ties had decayed and determined it was too dangerous to send crews up on the burning bridge. From boats on the river, crews fought the blaze using a camera mounted above the bridge as their eyes.

"You're 70 feet above the ground and the wind's blowing and that's the difficult factor as you can see the stream breaks up as it gets to it," said John Marstiller, a division chief of Harrods Creek Fire District who sent a fireboat to the scene. "We can't get directly underneath it due to the embers and things falling off of it so we have to do the best we can at that point."

Work crews were on the bridge when the blaze broke out. Waterfront Development deputy director Mike Kimmel tells me they were replacing lights on the system that helps barges navigate around the bridge. It is part of that system that Kimmel thinks may have caused the fire.

"It appears the culprit might be a junction box associated with the old navigation system that periodically did have some problems with it," said Kimmel.

The lunchtime fire on the Big Four sent smoke billowing that could be seen for miles. It attracted a crowd of onlookers as fire crews worked to put the blaze out.

The work being done on the Big Four is the latest phase of the Waterfront Development Plan. The bridge is supposed to become a pedestrian walkway that will eventually allow people to walk or run over the Ohio River and into Indiana.

The sight of a big fire on the Big Four Bridge was enough to make the lunchtime crowd at Waterfront Park just stop and stare. They found the burning bridge both eye catching and hard to watch.

"We seen the fire and I just thought it was a controlled burn and then all of a sudden, it started getting bigger," said Will Herring, an onlooker. "I just hate to see it like that because it's public property and we just acquired the bridge for a walkway and now it's going up in flames."

Kimmel says work on the pedestrian bridge itself hasn't even started. What the fire might do to its future is unclear.

"We don't know yet. We don't know if it sets it back at all," said Kimmel. 

Online Reporter:  Janelle MacDonald

Online Producer: Charles Gazaway