What Caused The Waltham Fire? Investigators Asking For Help

WALTHAM, MA — Three days after a blaze ripped through five almost finished apartment buildings under construction on the corner of Cooper and Elm streets on the South Side of Waltham, investigators are still looking for clues as to what started the 10-alarm fire.

The 264 unit apartment building at Cooper Street is completely gone, at least two other buildings - including an auto body shop and a restaurant sustained damage and more than 20 cars were damaged in the fire.

The Waltham Fire and Police Departments, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and the Massachusetts State Police with the Office of the State Fire Marshal are all investigating the fire.

"In my 32 years this is one of the, if not the largest fire," Fire Chief Paul Ciccone told Patch at the time. (Check out a photo gallery of the fire here)

Now here's where you come in: Police and fire officials are looking for photos that show where the blaze may have started, or the early stages of the fire.

The call for photos comes on the day Boston officials released the official cause of a similar fire that took place last month in Dorchester, leveling a nearly completed $45 million mixed use condominium building there. Boston Fire Commissioner Joseph E. Finn said Wednesday it was an improperly installed exhaust pipe that caused the fire. Apparently heated by diesel fumes it caught the wood framing on fire, he said.

The Waltham complex under construction by Callahan was also made from wood framing, instead of steel.

On a social media post in May commenting on the new construction in the city, some residents expressed surprise that the building was not made with steel framing and another noted that a handful of similarly wood framed buildings in New York and New Jersey had gone up in flames in the past couple of years, while the buildings were under construction, before any drywall or fireproofing had been put in.

RELATED:

Waltham Fire Chief On 8 Alarm Fire: 'We're Going To Be Here For A While'

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Updates to come

Photo by Jenna Fisher