By Diane Pineiro-Zucker
Daily Freeman
TOWN OF POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y. — Firefighters from at least 15 Dutchess and Ulster County fire departments responded Wednesday to a “devastating … inferno” involving multiple connected buildings at the former Hudson River Psychiatric Center on North Road ( U.S. Route 9 ), responding fire departments and Dutchess County Executive Sue Serino said Wednesday.
The Fairview Fire Department is the lead agency, and as of about 4:30 Wednesday, no injuries had been reported.
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On Facebook, Serino posted, “This just in! Drone footage from the devastating fire at the old Hudson River Psychiatric Center happening now. … take precautions for those with breathing issues. Sending prayers to our brave service personnel as they work to contain the inferno.”
At about 4 p.m., Town of Poughkeepsie police asked residents to avoid the Hudson Heritage Plaza area on North Road as “the plaza is being closed to assist with current firefighting operation.” They also asked that all “civilian” drone activity cease.
The fire could be seen from parts of Ulster County and at least two Ulster fire departments were assisting at the scene, Serino said.
An employee at the Fairview Fire Department, who declined to give his name because he is not authorized to speak to the media, said the former psychiatric center buildings caught fire at about 10:30 a.m. Wednesday. Three or four connected buildings on the site were involved, and the cause of the blaze is undetermined, he said.
In a post on Facebook, the Arlington Professional Firefighters Association said their members “are operating mutual aid to Fairview Professional Firefighters … at a large-scale incident involving two separate building fires at Hudson Heritage,” a corporation that owns the facility and planned to build there.
“The former Hudson River Psychiatric Center sat vacant just north of Marist University along Route 9 in Poughkeepsie, New York, for many years. The 156-acre site includes more than 75 buildings on both the State and National Registers of Historic Places as well as a Frederick Law Olmsted -designed central green,” according to the Hudson Heritage/Labella Industries website. “Plans were underway that “reimagine the site … creating a plan that honors the site’s historic landscape and re-uses buildings, where feasible, while respecting environmental limitations.”
The hospital operated from 1873 until it closed in the early 2000s. It continued to be operated by the state Office of Mental Health and closed in 2012.
The Fairview Fire Department employee said the involved buildings had been used to provide food to residents of the psychiatric center. “This was the central area where they had the main kitchens and stuff where they cooked for all the patients and stuff,” he said.
Hudson Heritage plans to include “750 residential units, 350,000 square feet of commercial space, a hotel, over 6,400 linear feet of new town roadways, more than 10,000 linear feet of private roadway, as well as utilities,” according to its website. Hudson Heritage could not immediately be reached for comment.
Reached at about 4:30 p.m. Wednesday , the Fairview employee said the fire continued to burn. He said there are narrow streets on the campus and few nearby fire hydrants. “So they’re pumping water for quite a distance … it’s all brick and wood-frame construction.”
The employee said squatters have been known to occupy buildings on the site but the new owners have been “chasing them out.”
He continued, saying the fire “is going to burn for quite a while. going to go on all night at least and they’re going to have to stay there. … And, of course, because the buildings are abandoned, nobody’s going in for safety reasons.”
Dutchess County Emergency Response advised residents of western Dutchess and eastern Ulster counties to avoid breathing the smoke and to close their windows. The Hudson Heritage Plaza adjacent to the property closed “to support firefighting operations. Please avoid the area until further notice,” Emergency Response posted.
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