Flames engulf vacant church near CLT airport with nearly two centuries of history
A vacant church building with a congregation that spanned nearly two centuries of history, caught fire in southwest Charlotte on Thursday morning.
Around 10 a.m., 30 Charlotte firefighters began extinguishing the fire at Big Spring United Methodist Church at 5300 Old Dowd Road, near Charlotte Douglas International Airport. Heavy smoke and fire were visible as crews arrived, the Charlotte Fire Department said in a post on Twitter.
It took firefighters about 50 minutes to control the blaze. No injuries were reported, and the cause of the fire remains under investigation, the department said in another tweet.
Big Spring United Methodist Church may have been empty Thursday, but in the 1960s, before the airport’s expansion, every pew was filled, according to Observer archives.
The Big Spring congregation dates to at least 1834, when members built an arbor and started a campground church, Observer archives show. The campground evolved into a traditional church during the 1860s.
The church’s name derives from a spring that served a practical purpose in the 1800s. During church gatherings, horses used to drink from the spring, the Observer previously reported.
“It’s ironic to me that the church that started off by supplying water through a spring is now being consumed by fire,” David Carl, the Chaplin at Atrium Health who served as pastor of Big Spring for the church’s final 10 years, told the Observer on Thursday. “It’s quite a cycle of life.”
Big Spring, which sits on a hill, used to house more than 300 members from homes throughout the Charlotte region, Observer archives show. Membership dwindled as families sold their homes and the airport expanded.
The church closed in 2019, Carl said. There is a cemetery on the property, according to Charlotte Mecklenburg Library.
“While we we paid the bills and kept up with all the financial obligations because this was a faithful group, nonetheless, we weren’t growing and fulfilling what I think our mission as a United Methodist Church was meant to do,” Carl said.
Mecklenburg County property records show the land sold for $1.465 million in January 2020.
“I’m kind of a little bit shocked myself by this,” Carl said. “I expected one day down the pipe, maybe several years, to see the structure leveled. Never did I picture a fire being a part of the scene.”
This story was originally published September 30, 2021 at 5:04 PM.
