Dog found alive in charred building day after massive fire

SAN FRANCISCO -- San Francisco firefighters are continuing to monitoring a four-alarm fire that broke out at a building on Mission and 22nd Streets Wednesday night. One man died and six people were hurt.

It was a three story multi-use building that had businesses on the first and second floors and apartments on the third floor. Thousands of gallons of water was pumped onto the fire and some minor flooding started to occur on the streets, due to the amount of water trying to go down the drains.

RAW VIDEO: Mission fire from ground level

There were 125 firefighters that responded to the scene and after a while, they said they had to take a defensive position and let the building burn. Around 10 p.m. a large section of the roof collapsed.

The six people taken to the hospital suffered burns and smoke inhalation. A firefighter was one of the injured.

PHOTOS: Crews battle massive fire in SF's Mission District

Ricardo Cedeno was coming home from work and couldn't do anything but watch as his home went up in flames. He lived in the building with his family for 12 years. His mother and stepfather were home when the fire broke out. His stepfather was able to run out and knock on doors to alert his neighbors.

"He was washing something in the kitchen and then he headed to the bathroom. Two minutes later when he was coming back, he saw the flames coming out of the closets. Devastating, we pretty much lost everything," said Cedeno.

During the fire, there was a lot of panic and chaos. A 5-year-old girl was lost and later found, a boy and his dog had to be rescued. Some escaping down the fire escapes couldn't make it to the ground because the street signs were blocking them. Firefighters then used a ladder to get those folks down. Amazingly a dog was found in alive in the burned building Thursday morning.

"I guess around 6:35 p.m. or so I heard somebody shriek on the second floor and then didn't think anything about it because there are kids up there and they run around a lot. About five minutes or less later, I saw the fire trucks pull up on Mission Street and I looked out the window and they were looking up at us," said San Francisco resident, Matthew Graham.

The fire created a huge cloud of smoke that was blowing across Highway 101 and could be smelled for miles.

The fire is still having an impact on Muni buses. The transit agency had to shut down the 14, 49 and 33 lines on Mission from 16th street to Cesar Chavez. Service in that area is running on South Van Ness Thursday morning. You can also take BART if you want to get through the Mission District.

The building appears to be a total loss. The cause of the fire remains under investigation, but it does not appear to be suspicious.

The Red Cross says the best thing you can do is by donating money. To help victims of the Mission District fire, donations can be sent to the San Francisco chapter of the Red Cross.