Atmos building burns downtown, neighbors lose power

A large structure fire broke out in downtown Jackson Tuesday night in the old Atmos building, bringing spectators out of their homes, many of which had no electricity.

It's not clear if the Entergy customers without power lost their electricity due to the fire, but the Entergy website shows the area surrounding the fire has 1,080 customers affected. All the street lights and traffic signals were also out for blocks surrounding the blaze.

Jackson Fire Department Chief Investigator Gregory Travis said at this point firefighters are still fighting the fire, and there's no clear answer as to what caused it. He said he's still gathering information on how big the fire was when firefighters were called out, and if an interior attack was even possible.

For the large portion of the attack on the structure fire, firefighters dumped water on the blaze from above in aerial trucks.

Travis said preliminary reports say there are no known injuries.

"Right now we don't have any information to lead us to believe that anyone is in there, or that there could have been anyone in the building when it started," he said.

Officials should know more about the blaze once it is contained and a routine investigation can be done.

To contact Therese Apel, call (601) 961-7236, or follow @TRex21 on Twitter

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