A longtime business on U.S. 129 or Cleveland Highway north of Gainesville could be declared a total loss after fire damaged it early Tuesday morning.
Millie's Drapery and Decorating broke out in flames before 5:15 a.m. sending Hall County firefighters and Gainesville firefighters under mutual aid to the building. Investigators said the fire is accidental and electrical in nature.
"Basically I got a call at about 7:15 from Zach Brackett of Hall County Fire Services that I had a fire, and that I needed to get on over here, (that) it was pretty bad," business owner John Kinsey said.
Fire crews had equipment on the actual roadway during the fire fight, forcing the closure of the busy traffic artery for about three hours during morning rush hour. Word of the fire and road closure came from Hall County emergency dispatchers around 5:40 a.m., the road back open again around 8:40 a.m.
"They (firefighters) initially attempted an offensive operation, however, due to the fire conditions, they had to pull back, get a lot of water on the fire and go defensive," Brackett said Tuesday morning.
Firefighters were then able to return to the offensive fight and were putting out hot spots later in the morning.
"No injuries at this time, and all of our personnel are injury-free as well," Brackett said.
As daylight emerged, Kinsey was already in the process of getting his business back into operation.
"The short term plan is to get some kind of portable building in here to get an office set back up ASAP, and then wait on insurance to evaluate what needs to be done, if we need to bulldoze it," Kinsey said.
The business has been around since 1968, according to its website. Kinsey said that won't change.
"Yea, we'll build it back. It's pretty much a total loss."
AccessWDUN's Marc Eggers contributed to this story.
