It was just a little grease fire in the kitchen, so at first Mike Tirone wasn't all that worried.
"Flames were shooting up as high as the hood," said the 24-year-old Tirone, who was working Saturday night as a bartender at the Charles Village Pub & Patio, a longtime Towson fixture and popular watering hole for students at nearby Towson University.
"But we've had grease fires in the kitchen before," he said. "So, we were all very casual, to be honest. It didn't seem that serious at first."
But Tirone and the other two employees at the tavern, popularly known as the CVP, were about to discover firsthand how quickly open flames can burn out of control. By the time firefighters were called at 7:25 p.m., the blaze had broken through into the exhaust system and was in the process of destroying the wooden interior, leaving just a brick facade standing.
Forty people who were employed Saturday found themselves out of a job on Sunday. But one of the bar's owners, Rick Bielski, is relieved that none of the three employees nor half-dozen customers who were inside when the two-alarm fire started were harmed.
"Thank God it was early in the evening and we weren't that busy yet," said Bielski, who owns two additional taverns in Charles Village and Lutherville.
"If it had happened three hours later, we would have been packed," he said. "I've been at that location nearly 23 years. Sitting there with the Fire Department and watching it all go down last night was very emotional. I'm still in a daze to a certain extent."
The employees quickly put out the fire in the kitchen. At least, that's what they thought.
But, just to be safe, they decided to check out a second-floor storage area directly above the range. When Tirone ventured upstairs, he noticed a few small flames in one corner. He bolted down the steps, grabbed the fire extinguisher, and raced up to the storeroom again. But when he opened the door, he backed away. In the space of less than a minute, the room had become engulfed in smoke.
"That's when we decided to get everyone out," he said.
"I called 911, and we made an announcement, 'Everyone needs to leave.' We had the customers pay their tabs first; the fire was still confined to the back rooms, and we still didn't think it was going to be much of anything.
"It wasn't until I got outside that I realized we were going to be shut down for longer than just one night," Tirone said. "That's when it began to seem surreal. I realized that if we'd been any later catching this thing, it could have been dangerous."
About 100 firefighters and 25 trucks responded to the blaze. Both adjoining buildings — an office building at 17 W. Pennsylvania Ave. and the Hamilton Federal Bank branch one door west — suffered water damage and are temporarily closed.
On Sunday afternoon, the smell of smoke suffused the bank lobby, and the basement was flooded. Bank president Robert DeAlmeida said he expects that the branch will reopen in several days.
"We were fortunate," he said.
Outside the pub, a customer left a makeshift memorial stuck in a snow bank consisting of three bouquets of white freesia, spider mums and carnations. Arrayed in front of the blossoms were seven plastic shot glasses in hues of orange, plum and lime.
"The CVP was small, but college kids owned it," said Tyler Laporte, 26, who frequented the bar when he attended school at Towson University.
The drinks were cheap; students could play drinking games like beer pong and flip cup, and the heated patio made it possible to smoke legally outdoors while staying warm and dry.
"Most of the beer was out of cans," said Laporte, who still lives in Towson. "You'd be there with a big group of friends, and every time you went there you'd see a lot of the same people. When you went to CVP, it felt like you were at a party more than you were at a bar."
By 5 pm Sunday, 22 hours after the tavern was destroyed, bar owner Bielski said his cell phone had collected 157 voice mails and text messages of former customers and employees who were offering their commiseration.
"There's been so much support that it's given me and the other owners the strength to go through the effort to rebuild and make it all happen again," he said.
"It might take us eight to 10 months. We have a lot of work to do. But we will reopen in the very near future."