VIDEO: An iconic Sturgis saloon had been going full throttle for years, until one day, tragedy struck. โWe woke up on the morning of the 8th of September of 2015 to gone, just gone,โ said the Full Throttle Saloonโs administrative assistant, Kimm Lischefska.
Sturgisโ beloved Full Throttle Saloon went up in flames the night before, destroying a biker sanctuary that many people would flock to during the motorcycle rally.
The saloonโs administrative assistant says when she first heard the news through text, she thought it wasnโt true. โIโm looking at that and going, โWhy are you punking me at 3:15 in the morning?โ said Lischefska. โAnd then I realized, it was my aunt Chris from Sioux Falls, and she wouldnโt do that. So, I texted her and she said, โWell, itโs gone hun.โโ
One of the saloonโs general managers, Randy Westendorf, recalls the moment he showed up to the scene of the fire. โProbably about half the bar was engulfed when I got there, and then from there, it just kept spreading until it burnt all the way around,โ said Westendorf.
After the aftermath, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives was called in to investigate, taking them a week to discover what started the spark. โUnderneath the bar, we had a little dorm-sized fridge,โ said Lischefska. โWe had it on wheels because the keg was in it. And over time, moving it around like we did to load and unload it, we did that to the cord. So, the wire was partially broken but we couldnโt tell, and it arced and overheated.โ
Lischefska said the wire went on to ignite a box of beer steins and then burned through the liquor control system. Fortunately, no one was killed or injured in the fire, yet the road to recovery wasnโt an easy one. The new Full Throttle Saloon is located off of Highway 79, about seven miles from where the original saloon stood.
