There’s still a lot we don’t know about the frightening Sunday
evening arson that chased holiday season shoppers and store
employees from the Target on Airline Highway. This much we do know:
A lot of people played a part in preventing a tragedy.
There’s still a lot we don’t know about the frightening Sunday evening arson that chased holiday season shoppers and store employees from the Target on Airline Highway. This much we do know: A lot of people played a part in preventing a tragedy.
This could have been so much worse than it was.
Calm reaction by Target employees in the minutes after the fire was discovered and a quick, coordinated response by four fire departments helped prevent injury or worse to those inside the store at the time of the fire and kept property damage to a relative minimum.
Hollister Fire Chief Bill Garringer credited Target staff with getting customers out the door as quickly as possible.
“The Target employees did a great job of evacuating everybody before our arrival,” Garringer said. “I think they must have practiced before.”
Five engines, two ladder trucks and 32 firefighters from Hollister, Aromas, San Juan Bautista and Gilroy had the two-alarm fire under control in little more than an hour.
Arson investigators were on the case while the smoke was still clearing.
Within three days, they had identified and arrested a suspect – a 17-year-old Hollister boy who turned himself in to the San Benito County Sheriff’s Office on Wednesday afternoon.
According to Sheriff’s Lt. Roy Iler, the teenager “walked in and stated he wanted to talk to someone and turn himself in for setting fires.”
Hollister Police Chief Jeff Miller said investigators had already identified the boy as the prime suspect in the Target fire, thanks to evidence found on in-store surveillance tapes, and were preparing to arrest him the next day.
So far, neither fire investigators nor Target officials have released an estimate of the damage done by the arsonist.
So far, we have no way of understanding what could possibly have motivated someone to set a fire in a crowded store.
Eventually, we’ll know more.
But meanwhile, we offer a pat on the back to the Target employees who kept their cool Sunday in a time of crisis and made sure everyone got safely out of the store.
We also offer thanks to Hollister’s finest and to our neighbors for helping in a time of need.
