A fire broke out on the roof of the gymnasium at St. Petersburg Catholic High School on Tuesday afternoon, sending smoke billowing over the West St. Petersburg campus while a junior varsity volleyball team was in the middle of practice. No one was injured, and school officials say every student and staff member made it out safely.
Emergency calls were first logged around 3:54 p.m. for the fire at the 6333 9th Avenue North campus, near the Eagle Crest and Garden Manor neighborhoods, according to FOX 13 Tampa Bay. St. Petersburg Fire Rescue described the incident as a multiple-alarm structure fire, and the response escalated quickly: WTSP reported the response was upgraded to a third alarm at 4:43 p.m., pulling in mutual aid from surrounding municipalities and eventually deploying more than 40 fire units to the 40-acre campus.
The fire is believed to have started around 3:30 p.m. in the gymnasium, according to reporting by WFLA. Allison Munden, communications director for the Catholic Diocese of St. Petersburg, told the outlet that the junior varsity volleyball team was practicing in the gym when the fire occurred and that the players exited the building safely. School officials believe a lightning strike may have caused the blaze, though St. Petersburg Fire Rescue has said the official cause remains under investigation.
Quick Response Credited With Limiting Damage
Munden said first responders arrived very quickly and commended firefighters for tackling the blaze fast, per the same account. She said fire damage was mostly contained to the roof, though the fire also caused water and smoke damage to other parts of the building. The full scope of the damage is not yet known, WFLA reported, and authorities had parents pick up their children in front of the school as the response unfolded.
Florida's atmosphere gives the lightning theory some weight even before investigators confirm a cause. The state recorded 88.4 million total lightning flashes in 2025 as part of a 9.8% nationwide surge in strike activity, according to a national weather report published by Advanced Environmental Monitoring, which found Florida still trails only Oklahoma in strike density nationally. The Catholic Diocese of St. Petersburg asked the community to pray for firefighters, first responders, and the entire school community, the same report noted.
Fire Strikes Amid Major Campus Expansion
Tuesday's blaze hit a campus already in the middle of a sweeping transformation. St. Petersburg's Development Review Commission approved an 11-phase, $64 million master plan in July to build more than 163,000 square feet of new academic, athletic, and administrative space across the 40-acre site, as Hoodline detailed in its report on the city-approved campus makeover. According to St. Pete Rising, construction was already underway on Phase 1, a new STEM building called the Center for Scientific Discovery managed by Hennessy Construction Services, at the time of the fire.
The school's footprint has been growing to match its enrollment. Student enrollment at St. Petersburg Catholic climbed 77%, from 285 to 504 students, over nine years under President Ross Bubolz, the Diocese of Saint Petersburg reported in September 2025. The campus previously underwent a $1.5 million renovation completed in January 2021 that turned its media center into the Learning Commons and added the John and Esther O'Brien Immaculate Heart of Mary Chapel, according to Gulf Coast Catholic.
School Also Navigating Athletics Dispute
The fire also comes months after Pinellas County Schools directed public high schools to pause athletic contests against St. Petersburg Catholic pending a review of student transfers and coaching hires, a directive Hoodline covered in its report on the district freezing athletic matchups. That scheduling dispute is separate from Tuesday's emergency but adds to a stretch of high-profile developments for a school that has operated on the same West St. Petersburg site since it opened in February 1957 as Bishop Barry High School for boys, before merging with Notre Dame Academy in 1973 to form St. Petersburg Catholic, per historical records on Wikipedia.
The Catholic Diocese of Saint Petersburg has directly overseen the school through its Office of Catholic Schools and Centers since March 2017, after the Salesians of Don Bosco had managed the institution for 19 years. For now, school officials say the immediate priority is assessing the smoke and water damage beyond the gym roof, while St. Petersburg Fire Rescue continues investigating what sparked the flames.
