By A.J. Harris

PONTIAC – At just before 11:00 in the morning Saturday, an employee of Wright’s Furniture detected smoke in the store’s warehouse.

By the time he returned with a fire extinguisher, it was already too late.

Firefighters arrived on the scene around 11:40 and found the Wright’s Furniture warehouse in Pontiac completely engulfed in flames, which then spread to the Duffy’s Ambulance Service building next door.

Firefighters from Pontiac, as well as many surrounding departments, fought the blaze well into the afternoon.

The warehouse was a total loss and Duffy’s suffered extreme damage.

Pontiac Mayor Bob Alvey, who also works at the furniture store, said that the fire spread very rapidly, but praised all the firefighters on the scene.

“All the departments have done such an admirable job,” he said.

He went on to praise the community, saying that tragedies such as this one bring the people together.

This was proven with donations of food and water from various community businesses, including Casey’s and Jimmy John’s.

“Pontiac has been through this before,” the mayor went on to say, “And we’ll get through it again.”

There have not been any damage estimates as of yet, and the cause of the fire is still under investigation.

No one was injured.

A.J. Harris can be reached at [email protected]