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Below is video of the scene just after 5pm this evening. Almost 12 hours in, the fire continued to burn as firefighters blasted the Roebothan McKay Marshall rubble pile with water:

I was just walking into J Korean Restaurant for dinner at the time. In case you’re unaware, this restaurant is amazing.

When I walked out a little over an hour later, the fire was out.

Click to enlarge.

I don’t think downtown can take much more of this.

The St. John’s Regional Fire Department came to the rescue in Mount Pearl today when someone noticed smoke coming from their neighbours home and called it in.

According to The Telegram, no humanz were inside, but a cat was found unresponsive. The firefighters revived the lucky cat, while a second cat, who escaped through an open window, was in no need of assistance.

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If your rush hour commute in any way involves driving downtown, you might want to try taking the long way around today. Chances are it’ll be shorter in the long run.

I went downtown today to take a look at the situation after last night’s fire. The cleanup from the demolition was still busily underway as of 4pm this afternoon.

As the excavator filled the dump truck, it would drive off and another one would arrive to take it’s place.

It’s weird, almost like Water Street is missing a tooth.

Here’s some video:

The cleanup efforts had to block off Water Street traffic from both sides of the block, making what was already a bad traffic area (due to the harbour cleanup construction) even worse. Bad as it was, drivers did appear to be taking it in stride.

On the bring side, it made crossing the roads much, much easier.

Chris Whalen, who shot this earlier daylight footage of the fire being fought downtown, returned to the scene late last night and early this morning to capture the before and after of the demolition fire fighting efforts.

Chris Whalen was on the scene early yesterday evening and captured some fantastic footage as fire fighters began their work in battling the stubborn downtown blaze.

This photo was taken not long ago by Signal reader Darcy Butler. In case you’re thinking of checking out the situation for yourself, Butler had this to say:

It would be advised to avoid the area, particularly in vehicles as large portions of both Water and Duckworth streets are closed down. But anyone wishing to see some impressive displays of firefighting, take a walk along Water and head for the Scotia Centre. Be aware, there is a large stream pouring down McBrides forcing pedestrians to drop to the bottom of the hill to cross.

Karen Chappell of local photo blog Bitstop was downtown today and took what may well be the last photo of the area before the blaze began this evening.

This photo was taken by Signal reader Craig Cutler not long ago.

According to a report from The Telegram, the fire, which is believed to have started at 148 Water Street, has spread through the four attached buildings ending at the corner of Water Street and McBrides Hill.

In an exciting taste of what might be to come for news and information delivery, I’m pleased to present a very crappy photo, taken from my phone from the window of the QEII library at MUN, of what looks like a fire possibly in the dump area, from my vantage, north and east of Quidi Vidi Lake.

From what we’ve heard lately, water seems to be scarce on the Avalon. I’m wondering if this has anything to do with the lack of moisture.