[Jim Skelly]

Large fire destroys abandoned historic factory in Jackson (fox47news.com)

not much information in this article

[Jayce]

It will be interesting to see they can find the cause. I have a feeling it had a little 'help'.

[Paul Philco322]

Buy it, burn it?

[Jim Skelly]

If the building was going to be renovated, asbestos remediation is quite expensive. If the building was to be torn down for redevelopment, asbestos remediation would have been required.

[Jayce]

It's always possible the new owner had someone help it along although it could have been a homeless person living it in, a random arsonist, someone cooking up some drugs, or just a carelessly flung cigarette. Most abandoned buildings like that don't have any utilities running into them anymore, so unless lightning strikes the building, the fire is man made.
I hear you on the asbestos remediation and it is way too expensive anymore and our country's love of putting it in everything has and is still dooming a lot of our older structures to demolition or the owner just lets them fall in on themselves. I guess if a building has to be torn down in an emergency removal, all that is required is to keep the structure hosed down to keep the asbestos dust down. At least around here that is how it is handled. And yes, cities in my area do that too. The wait until a structure with asbestos in it becomes dangerous then do an emergency demolition to avoid the remediation costs, though the emergency demolitions are getting quite expensive as well.

[Jim Skelly]

I couldn't find any other article regarding the fire. It would be interesting to find out what the fire marshal determines as the cause. You bring up a lot of good possibilities as to the fire's origin.

[MrFixr55]

In NYC, Asbestos removal is the same procedure whether the building is being renovated or torn down, particularly if loose or spray on insulation was used.

[Jayce]

Sad thing is, we might never know the cause as fire is very good at destroying the evidence of its cause. Even if the building is still standing, it is often too unsafe to enter for investigation and any cause of the fire is lost in the demolition. A good example is the once beautiful Freemasons Temple that burnt down in Zanesville, Ohio. Even though the floor that the fire started on was basically still there, the structure was too much of a hazard to enter or even leave up as it was totally gutted from that floor on up. This was a building still in use for shops for all seven floors. Once in a rare while you do get an AH Ha moment like when they found out a cheap desk lamp from Walmart burnt the third floor and roof off a 125 year old building near me or the remains of one the Molatov cocktail bottles that was used to burn down the Garver's building in Strasburg, Ohio, but it's rare. Now if it somehow started on a concrete slab in the bottom of the building, there is a chance. That's what happened with the Garver's building as one bottle did not make it all the way in and landed on the concrete right inside the door. Sorry for the long winded reply.