Brookings Cinema 5 theater catches fire

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Workers repair the damage caused to the roof of Cinema 5 due to a fire on Friday night on Saturday, Aug.20, 2016 in Brookings, S.D.

Makenzie Huber

A fire on the Cinema 5 rooftop made movie-goers evacuate the building Friday night.

No one was injured. Damage to the building will temporarily force Cinema 5 to become Cinema 4 as a theater will be closed for repairs.

Although the fire only damaged the roof, smoke from the fire and water from firefighters damaged theater five.

Repairs should be completed within the next month, said Dick Peterson, Brookings Cinema 5 owner. The screen, sound and wall decorations for theater five, in the southwest corner of the building, will be replaced.

Construction work on the theater expansion is not impacted, he said.

Peterson said there isn’t a definite cause of the fire. One possibility is an electrical fire from a project on the roof. Another theory is that the theater was struck by lightning in Thursday night’s storm.

Workers reported a leak in the movie theater roof earlier Friday and roof workers repaired a piece of the roof that had a perfect circle-shaped hole in it caused by lightning the night before, Peterson said. He thinks the rubber membrane may have melted on the roof and caused the roof to catch fire.

To compensate for one less available theater, Cinema 5 will only be showing “Pete’s Dragon” during the day and “Sausage Party” during evening hours.