A member of the family that owns Patrick McGovern's Pub on West Seventh Street in downtown St. Paul says things could have been much worse.
The iconic building at the corner of West Seventh and Chestnut caught fire right around midnight Saturday morning when a car rammed into a nearby transformer, generating sparks that landed on the roof, the flames spreading downward.
Crews were able to douse the flames, but not before the 140-year-old building sustained some fire damage.
The bar was back open for business on Saturday night.
"Kind of spread a little but down the side of our building," said Cole Boehmer, spreading salt on the sidewalk in front of the place his family has run for more than four decades. "Luckily, most of the damage is water. It's nothing severe."
The flames did spread to the building's turret that's stood three stories up for all these years, but only a small part of the bottom was burned out.
The rest is still there, and will be rebuilt.
"It's mildly burned, nothing we can't fix, it's just wood," said Boehmer.
Boehmer's grandfather, Pat, was at the scene all night long.
"I'm sure he's thankful," said Boehmer, glancing up through the sunshine at the ice-coated structure.
"We're going to try to open as soon as possible," he said early Saturday. "We gotta make sure it's safe for people to come in. I think we're looking pretty good."
On a social media site operated by the pub, it was noted that the fire was caused by a "careless driver" who struck a transformer and fled the scene.
The transformer is on the other side of Interstate 35-E on Cathedral Hill, and the electrical surge from the collision knocked out power and sent sparks from power lines onto the roof of McGovern's.
Police have not reported any arrests.
Xcel Energy officials say about 13,000 customers lost power when the transformer was hit, but just about all were back on line by the time the sun came up.