A downtown building was substantially damaged after it collapsed late the night of Friday, March 31, according to information from Aberdeen Fire & Rescue.
Limited details are available as meetings about what happened were ongoing, JR Huebner, battalion chief with the fire department, said the morning of Saturday, April 1.
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But, he said, nobody was injured or in the building at the time it collapsed.
The fact that nobody was injured is a huge relief for one of the building owners, Jim Thares, who was downtown Saturday morning walking through the building with investigators. Thares said it’s heartbreaking to work so hard to preserve an Aberdeen building that’s more than 100 years old and see it destroyed. But, he said, he’s also thankful no other property was damaged and no one was injured.
Thares said contractors had recently finished framing the apartments in the building to the north and were going to start on the south building soon.
Fire department responds to collapsed building report at 11:06 p.m.
Aberdeen Fire & Rescue was called to a report of a collapsed building at 114 S. Main St. at 11:06 p.m. Friday.
The top two floors of the three-story building collapsed into the first floor, Huebner said. The building was not being used, but it was being worked on, he said.
It doesn’t appear there is any significant structural damage to neighboring buildings, Huebner said.
Thares said the pressure of the collapse blew out the two upper-story windows in the north building.
There was an isolated fire in the back of the building because the gas meter was damaged, but it didn’t spread, Huebner said.
Dan Cleberg, who owns the Red Rooster Coffee House a block to the south of the Van Slyke Building, said he was  blowing snow when he heard what sounded like an explosion.
“I saw the chute that was used to get demo rubbish into the dumpster. It had already fallen in the alley. I assumed it fell from the weight of the snow,” Cleberg said. “A girl ran up to me and said she felt rocks fall on her from over a half-block away. As I got closer, I saw the destruction and smelled gas, so I called 911.”
He said he had been in the alley about a half-hour before the collapse and, later, watched emergency crews respond.
10 inches of snow made response difficult
Firefighters were “falling over snowbanks trying to get to the building,” Cleberg said. “They were literally getting stuck in the snow as they approached it.”
It snowed most of Friday afternoon and into the night. Aberdeen got 10 inches of heavy snow, according to the National Weather Service. It clogged the streets and made even basic travel in town difficult.
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As of 1:15 p.m. Saturday, the 100 block of South Main Street was still blocked off. Huebner said hopes are to get at least one lane open open to traffic as soon as possible.
More information will be released as it’s available after meetings, including with city building officials, he said.