Lakes Region Linen's main plant was destroyed in a three-alarm fire, though the company's president said the business will continue.
According to the Lakes Region Mutual Fire Aid Association, a call for a structure fire went out to crews from Laconia and Gilford at 11:38 p.m. on Thursday and went to a second alarm at 11:42 p.m., bringing crews from Belmont, Meredith and Tilton-Northfield.
"Mutual Aid center advised us that they could see it from their rooftop camera," said Laconia Fire Chief Ken Erickson, saying Lt. Chris Shipp could see the glare from Central Station on North Main Street and called for a second alarm.
By midnight on Friday, one half of the building was destroyed and the other was fully engulfed. Erickson said the roof caved in which precluded crews from getting water to the fire.
A third alarm was struck later, at 12:40 a.m. on Friday, bringing crews from Belmont, Meredith, Gilmanton, Bristol, Alton, Holderness and Moultonborough.
Multiple lines were laid from nearby streets and from the Winnipesaukee River.
Erickson said there were "serious exposures" to the two buildings on the immediate right and left sides of Lakes Region Linen, as both buildings were five feet away from the burning building.
"[The] focus was to keep it from spreading to the neighborhood," Erickson said. "With the conditions we had it was a tough battle. It took a good hour and a half to actually get the fire under control."
Smoke was coming off the left building, owned by Jim Fitzgerald, though the building was not damaged. Crews pulled hoses over the backyard and fought the fire from the roof of Fitzgerald's house.
Neighbors along Belknap and Opechee streets stood on the side of the street and on their front lawns, many in pajamas, watching crews dousing the fire with water.
Neighbor Roger Provost said he saw "40-foot flames" coming from the building. He then woke up his wife, Kelly Provost, and daughter Melissa Perry and evacuated his house across the street from the fire.
"I started waking everybody up that I could in the neighborhood," Provost said.
A house next to Lakes Region Linen was evacuated but sustained no damage. Heavy smoke poured through the backyards of abutting houses along Lake Opechee.
"We could smell the smoke," said next door neighbor Pat Sutton, " I went out the door and I looked up" and saw high flames coming from the building. "At that point it was an inferno."
Erickson said the damage will likely be valued at several hundred thousand dollars, with machinery and inventory destroyed or heavily damaged. The building itself was "a total loss."
Lakes Region Linen President Debbie Frawley Drake said she received a call around 12:30 a.m. about the fire and stayed at the scene.
Drake said there is a small second shift that should have gotten out around 10 p.m. and it was likely there was no one in the building.
"We have so many checklists and safety lists that are checked off before supervisors leave," she said.
Frawley Drake said much of the inventory is in trucks located at the warehouse at the corner of Oak and Messer streets and she said the company would be able to take care of many customers on Friday.
As the company is a rental business, much of the product is also with customers.
The main focus now is to find another location to process items, which Frawley Drake said could be done at other businesses on a second- or third-shift schedule, depending on the circumstances.
"What's in the building is very substantial," she said. "Hopefully we can all do the right things in the next few days to come up with a plan."
Frawley Drake also expressed her appreciation for the efforts of fire crews who responded to the scene.
The fire remains under investigation with no cause having been identified.
"The damage is so severe it will be difficult to determine," Erickson said.
No one was in the building at the time of the fire and no fire personnel entered the building.
Crews left the fire around 10 a.m. on Friday, though a rekindle brought Laconia crews back later in the morning.
Crews from National Grid, Public Service of New Hampshire and the N.H. Department of Environmental Services also were on the scene.
