Crews Battle South End Structure Fire in New Bedford

Crews this morning (June 12) are battling a two-alarm structure fire at 29 Ashley Street near the corner of Ruth Street in the South End of New Bedford.

Around 9:30 a.m. scanner traffic indicated that New Bedford Fire Department ladder trucks were on the scene of a three-story vacant wood-frame apartment building fire, that residents in the area were being evacuated, and that mutual aid was on the way from Fairhaven and Dartmouth.

At around 10:30 a.m. scanner traffic indicated that the fire was under control.

The Standard-Times reports the building was purchased in May for $220,000 by real estate investor John Afonso, who planned to rehab the property and rent it out. Afonso told the newspaper he learned of the fire from a tenant in the building next door, which he also owns. Afonso said he had recently pulled building permits to renovate the property.