The fate of a recently opened jazz club remains up in the air after a fire tore through the top floor of its building in Park Slope on Wednesday, killing two people and rendering the structure uninhabitable.
Mikhael Brovkine, one of the co-owners of Made in New York Jazz Cafe and Bar, which opened just three months ago, says the club suffered extensive damage from the thousands of gallons of water that New York’s Bravest poured onto the fire, which they now believe claimed most or all of their instruments and sound equipment. Fire Marshalls have determined that the fire was likely caused by an extension chord.
“It’s all gone,” Brovkine said.
On top of that, the place reeks of smoke, according to Brokvine’s partner, who suspects he’ll probably end up having to tear out the walls just to get rid of the odor.
“It all smells like barbecue,” co-owner Boris Bangiyev said after surveying the damage on Wednesday.
Brovkine is cautiously optimistic that he may be able to salvage some of his equipment, but said that an investigation conduct by the city’s Fire Marshall has prevented his team and his insurance company from taking a full inventory, and said until he’s effectively trapped in limbo until their investigation is concluded.
Until then, the jazzman couldn’t say definitely whether he’ll reopen or not in the wake of his club’s inauspicious start.
For all his troubles, Brovkine has his health, and the musician said his heart goes out to the two real victims of Wednesday’s fire, 22-year-old firefighter-in-training Steven Munoz and his girlfriend Destiny Marmolejo, who lost their lives after the fire erupted in their fourth-floor apartment, trapping them in their bedroom.
“It’s crazy, but the family on top of us has experienced much more,” he said. “People are dead, and this is the worst thing that can happen.”
