37 displaced after Oakland homeless camp fire

A fire at a homeless camp near Interstate Highway 880 in Oakland early Tuesday morning displaced about 37 people but no one was injured, a battalion chief said.

The blaze in the 2200 block of East 12th Street was reported at 2:41 a.m. and was contained shortly after 4 a.m., fire officials said.

About 15 or 16 tents were destroyed, Battalion Chief Demond Simmons said.

The cause of the fire is still under investigation, according to Simmons.

Although no one was injured by the blaze, firefighters who responded to it found a dead body in a part of the homeless camp that didn’t burn, Simmons said.

That person apparently had been dead for several days and the Oakland Police Department is now investigating that matter, he said.