Tacoma firefighters extinguish encampment fire on Puyallup Avenue near downtown

Tacoma firefighters on Monday extinguished a fire that burned at a homeless encampment on Puyallup Avenue near downtown and sent a column of dark smoke over the city’s skyline.

The fire was reported shortly after 9 a.m. in the 1400 block of Puyallup Avenue, near Portland Avenue, according to Tacoma Fire Department spokesperson Joe Meinecke. He said he wasn’t aware of any injuries.

Meinecke said “combustible material” associated with the encampment had burned. He didn’t have more details about precisely what caught fire. Meinecke said fire crews were still working to put out hot spots at about 10 a.m.

How the fire started is not yet clear. Meinecke said a fire investigator was called to the scene.

This story was originally published May 2, 2022 at 10:36 AM.

Peter Talbot

The News Tribune

Peter Talbot is a criminal justice reporter for The News Tribune. He started with the newspaper in 2021. Before that, he earned his bachelor’s degree in journalism at Indiana University. In college, he worked as an intern at NPR in Washington, D.C. He also interned for the Oregonian and the Tampa Bay Times. Support my work with a digital subscription