On top of everything else going on, a fire started at Fort Myers Airport (RSW) in Florida this past weekend. This fire destroyed more than 3,500 rental cars that were at a rental overflow lot.
3,500 Rental Cars Destroyed
In any normal year, there are tons of extra rental cars in Florida that companies try hard (through heavily discounted rates) to get people to drive north. When air traffic grinds to a major slowdown like it has, it means even more rental cars are just sitting there.
And when a fire started in the brush near the overflow lot, it spread quickly. At this time, there is no official word on what caused the fire.
The fire department was called on Friday afternoon and there were just 20 cars that had been burned. But, it quickly grew out of control to the point that soon it was 100 cars on fire and then, according to a specialist for the Florida Forestry Service, “By the time we had units on the scene, we had 100 cars (on fire). We lost count after the hundreds,” she said.
It took 18 hours to get the blaze under control and over 80 drops from the air to take care of it. According to the same specialist, there were no injuries reported and the no structures at the airport were affected.
It is certainly good news that there were no injuries with such an intense fire. If you were to pick up a rental car from Fort Myers, you may want to follow up with your rental company to see if this has affected your reservation in any way. According this news report, there were 3,800 other cars that were not damaged.
Featured image from the Charlotte Country Sheriff’s Office Facebook post
Wow. I never knew cars caught fire so readily. I guess maybe they all had full tanks of gas.
[…] Fire at the Fort Myers, Florida airport destroyed 3500 rental cars with as few people are renting cars at the airport nowadays the insurance payout is probably rental car companies’ lucky day. […]