ARKADELPHIA, AR – Investigators are looking into how a medical center in Arkadelphia caught on fire Monday morning.
The Arkadelphia Fire Department, along with assistance from departments in Caddo, arrived at the Gathright Medical Plaza around 3 a.m. to see three of the four businesses in the building engulfed in flames.
Vision Source of Arkadelphia, Baptist Health Family Clinic Therapy Center and The Surgical Clinic of Center Arkansas were all destroyed in the fire that Arkadelphia Fire Chief, Ricky Arnold, said started in one of the business attics then traveled through two firewalls.
“It was really heavy smoke—pushing smoke as we like to call it,” Arnold said.
The building left standing, Baptist Health Women’s Clinic, had a firewall also.
“It was two firewalls it went through. So it made it through two firewalls, which is unusual.”
Arnold, along with the city’s inspector, will look into whether there were any malfunctions with the building that did not prevent the fire from spreading. If the inspector and insurance investigators find there are, the contractors could be fined.
According to Baptist Health Medical Center’s spokesman, Mark Lowman, said the building was built in 2011. There were nearly 5,000 annual patients between three of the businesses. The businesses and patient services will be relocated, Lowman said, by Wednesday.
BHMC Administrator, John Bowen said that was a top priority.
“As soon as it happened, to make sure that we move services so that services could be interrupted as little as possible,” Bowen said.
This was refreshing for Harold McDuffie who was scheduled to pick up his daughter’s glasses this week.
“They’ll let us know exactly what to do and we’ll go from there,” McDuffie told FOX 16 Reporter, Leah Uko. “No body was in the building. It happened early in the morning so that’s the thankful part. This could be replaced. It could be rebuilt.”
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