The 12-story downtown Boston headquarters of Fidelity [profile] is reopening today after a two-alarm fire.

Yesterday afternoon about 2,500 Fidelity employees at 245 Summer Street were evacuated after a fire in the basement, yet Fidelity spokesman Vin Loporchio tells the Boston Globe that the building will be open today. A Boston Fire Department spokesman tells the Globe that it doesn't seem like the fire is suspicious, though they're still trying to figure out the cause. One firefigher reportedly went to the hospital for non-life-threatening injuries.

Multiple witnesses reported hearing loud bangs in the building's basement around 12:14pm yesterday. Word is that the fire was contained in the basement's electrical vault by 1:07pm.

"As soon as I came up to the ground floor, I started seeing smoke in the hallways," Andrew Polak, a subcontractor who was working in the basement at the time, tells the Globe. "It was just pouring out smoke ... It definitely sounded mechanical; didn't sound like an explosive."

Fidelity employees were sent to nearby South Station and to Fidelity's office in the World Trade Center in the Seaport District, the Boston Business Journal reports. Part of Summer Street was closed to traffic.

"Our other sites are ready as usual to assist customers via phone, chat, online, or at our Investor Centers," a Fidelity spokesperson tells the Journal.

Boston 25 News, the Boston Herald, and WCVB 5, twice, also reported on the fire.

Fidelity has had a presence in the building since 1999, and six years ago its headquarters moved into the building. 

Edited by: Neil Anderson, Managing Editor


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