Kids playing with lighter sparked Joliet warehouse fire

By Admin on August 31, 2009

Joliet police say two 11-year-old girls playing with a cigarette lighter started a fire at a tire recycling facility that turned into an extra-alarm blaze Sunday night.

“It’s arson, but it’s more like kids playing with a lighter,” Cmdr. Mike Trafton said today. The fire at Tire Grinders Transporters at 175 S. Desplaines St. began around 7:30 p.m. and lasted nearly two hours.

Joliet firefighters, including Christian Conroy (center), tend to smoldering rubble, today after a Sunday night fire destroyed two warehouses at a tire recycling company on DesPlaines Street in Joliet. No injuries were reported from the fire. (David Pierini/Chicago Tribune)

Trafton said the facility, consisting of two buildings, “looks completely destroyed.” The girls, who live nearby, entered the facility.

“They were playing where they shouldn’t have been,” Trafton said.

The girls have been turned over to their parents, pending review by the Will County state’s attorney’s office, the commander said.

–Dennis Sullivan

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