# Fire at Universal Studios Video Vault



## Les (Jun 2, 2008)

Anyone know what may have caused this? From the circumstances and location the most likely causes I would suspect are Electrical and Arson (because there was an arson there back in 1990). The pictures sure look devastating.

Edit: I just read on Yahoo News that it was roofers putting shingles on a building facade.


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## rosabelle334 (Jun 3, 2008)

Lester said:


> Edit: I just read on Yahoo News that it was roofers putting shingles on a building facade.



You mean they were the ones who started the fire?


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## gafftaper (Jun 3, 2008)

rosabelle334 said:


> You mean they were the ones who started the fire?



Mistakes while using hot tar roofing techniques are a common cause of fires.


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## Van (Jun 3, 2008)

I think it was probably Warren Beatty, in a desperate attempt to destroy the last remaining copy of _Ishtar._


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## What Rigger? (Jun 4, 2008)

"Fire at Universal Studios VIDEO Vault"???

Video??? Aw, c'mon children...this wasn't tape, this was FILM that was destroyed, and a big chunk of our history as an industry.

"Video"...lol...was Dracula shot on video? I think not. 
E.T., done on VHS? Nope.
You get my point.

Film is art. Theatre is life. Television is furniture.


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## derekleffew (Jun 4, 2008)

*Link.
*



* Universal Studios blaze burns sets, video vault*

...

 The blaze began around 4:45 a.m. (7:45 a.m. ET) and was contained initially by 9 a.m. Throughout the morning, large plumes of black smoke rose as the fire burned the vault containing hundreds of videos, said Ron Meyer, chief operating officer of Universal Studios.
 "Fortunately, nothing irreplaceable was lost," Meyer said. "The video library was affected and damaged, but our main vault of our motion picture negatives was not."


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## gafftaper (Jun 4, 2008)

What Rigger? said:


> "Fire at Universal Studios VIDEO Vault"???
> 
> Video??? Aw, c'mon children...this wasn't tape, this was FILM that was destroyed, and a big chunk of our history as an industry.
> 
> ...



Relax Rigger. The articles say they have backups of everything in a second location. It sounds like there were no serious injuries and nothing was destroyed that can't be replaced.


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## gafftaper (Jun 4, 2008)

charcoaldabs said:


> Sounds like what was destroyed were the "backups" all the original film is in another location, so in which case, as Derek points out, it was a video vault, and not a film vault.



Well the good news is if the originals are ever lost they will still be available for illegal download on the internets.


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## What Rigger? (Jun 6, 2008)

gafftaper said:


> Well the good news is if the originals are ever lost they will still be available for illegal download on the internets.



Thank you Jeebus. On any number of levels.

Freakin' news outlets and their bad syntax. (Sin tax? Oh no, I'm keepin' my money)

Illegal downloads are bad mmmmkayyyy?


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## LDTom (Jun 8, 2008)

Yah its to bad that clock tower from the Back to the future and the surrounding buildings got burned, King Kong especially. But to me from the picturs of the insides of some of those facades, it is no wonder that once they started burning they burned down in as hurry.

Sound like Universal plans to rebuild it all, after the investigation and probably under even stronger fire codes so that this won't happen again or if it does the buildings will not go up in flames so quickly.


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## cverdetech (Jun 20, 2008)

the entire film industry could survive just through internet bootlegs and streams, i dont think they're worried about that, but the sets and everything, thats gotta be rough for them too. 

in any sense, its universal and they have the money to rebuild, but its never going to be the same as the original videos, because you'll never get that first reel quality, and same for the sets as far as historical value, and thanks to the roofers a part of our pop-culture history is lost in the ashes.


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