A rubbish fire tore through a junkyard at the plant near Ralph Avenue and Preston Court in Canarsie on Wednesday afternoon, sending smoke billowing for miles across the Brooklyn skyline before firefighters brought it under control by 7:30 p.m.
Smoke from the blaze could be seen for miles, according to NBC New York, which reported that the FDNY confirmed the fire was under control by 7:30 p.m. City health officials advised neighbors to close their windows and stay indoors wherever smoke was present, per the same report. The footage of the smoke plume over the neighborhood was captured in video published by CBS News New York.
A Block With a Long History of Fire
This is far from the first time flames have erupted along the short industrial stretch of Preston Court. Brooklyn Paper has reported that the block experienced at least 12 fires over the previous six years, while a separate Brooklyn Paper count found Preston Court mentioned 21 times in connection with 11 distinct incidents on the FDNYalerts Twitter account dating back to July 2016 — two tallies that don't fully align but both point to the same troubled stretch of pavement.
Just two days before Wednesday's fire, another Preston Court junkyard a few doors away burned on Oct. 3, drawing a response from 60 firefighters, according to Brooklyn Paper's account of what it called the second fire on the block in just over a month. Days later, on Oct. 5, the FDNY responded to a fire at T & A Scrapyard at 5709 Preston Court, as amNewYork reported, where live wires burning on the rear of a trailer hampered firefighting operations and Hazmat Company 1 had to remove two propane cylinders from the premises. That scrapyard alone had seen eight fires over the previous three years, amNewYork noted.
Earlier Blazes Brought Bigger Responses and Injuries
Some of the Preston Court fires have required far larger operations than Wednesday's. A fire at S&A Scrap Iron & Metal near East 56th Street on July 13 reached two alarms, and one firefighter sustained minor injuries and was recuperating in the hospital afterward, Brooklyn Paper reported. That same blaze sent up a massive plume of smoke visible from hundreds of yards away and damaged a structure at the site.
An even larger response unfolded on September 16, 2021, when a fire at S&A Scrap Iron & Metal on Preston Court eventually climbed to three alarms, requiring roughly 138 FDNY personnel and 33 units, according to Brooklyn Paper's reporting at the time. Firefighters battled that blaze for more than two hours before finally getting it under control at 5:27 p.m. A prior fire at the junkyard that September was traced to an e-bike battery concealed in a pile of scrap iron, the outlet reported — a hazard the FDNY has flagged as a growing citywide problem, estimating lithium battery fires were on track to double year over year.
Another Fire, Same Unanswered Questions
Not every Preston Court fire has caused injuries. A separate two-alarm blaze at a junkyard between Ralph Avenue and Kings Highway broke out at 2:38 p.m. and drew more than 100 firefighters before it was declared under control by 5 p.m., with Brooklyn Paper reporting no injuries, though several vehicles stored at the site were singed. Social media users tracking FDNY radio traffic, including the account @NYCFireWire on X
, have flagged multiple all-hands and second-alarm responses to scrapyard fires on the block over the years, underscoring how often Preston Court shows up in FDNY dispatch chatter.
What sparked Wednesday's fire has not been determined, and city agencies have not released additional details beyond the timeline already confirmed. The FDNY creates records for its responses to fires and other emergencies within New York City, according to NYC311, but with so many blazes having struck this same stretch of Preston Court, residents are left once again watching smoke rise over Canarsie and wondering when the next one will come.
