• Fire At El Comal Restaurant

Early Sunday morning a fire broke out at a popular Wildomar eatery.

The fire started around 6:45am, thankfully before the breakfast crowd had a chance to start getting there. As it was, there were workers and a few customers that had to be evacuated.

On the scene were three of Wildomar's elected officials, council members Ben Benoit and Marsha Swanson and mayor Bridgette Moore.

Local resident Michael Miera, a young man interested in fire science, was listening to the scanner and heard the call go out. He notified the mayor right away.

Councilmember Benoit gave me some details. 
 

A RSO deputy saw smoke and the deputy called it in over the radio. He got a quick response to "deputy needs assistance, fire at El Comal." 

The tough part will be that they're renters and a [lot will depend on] the situation with the [land] owner's insurance. 

The other tough part will be if they can open back up under state code, because it (the building) doesn't meet a lot of the ADA requirements, and other such things that's been grandfathered for decades. That's going to make it very hard to reopen.

He wanted to add a bit more to the story.
 

When I got here, I immediately made contact with the owner of the restaurant, she was very upset and her son was here early this morning too. It's very sad to see a local business owner [going through this] but her biggest concern was immediately [being] worried about her employees, and where they'll be working over this Christmas holiday. 

If anyone knows of anyplace that these people can work during the holidays —restaurant work— that's what their biggest concern is, making sure that their employees have some place to go.

Below is a video link to a two minute video after the flames had been extinguished. 

Here's another link to the video if for some reason you can't see the link above.

The fire is still under investigation and no cause has been determined.

The view from Sylvester Rd.

Here's a link to El Comal's Yelp page. they have a 4.5 star rating with 185 reviews. If you enjoy their food, leave them a comment. 

Here is a link to their facebook page.

Updated by Battalion Chief Todd Phillips at the city council meeting: link to blog here.

•        •        •

There is nothing as sweet as a comeback, when you are down and out, about to lose, and out of time.

—Anne Lamott

Wildomar Rap is rooting for El Comal to make a triumphant comeback.