As promised, our virtual tour through the backlot of the Universal Studios is not complete. As I told you in the previous episodes, this set has suffered two major fires in 1990 and in 2008, because the buildings and structures that govern them are completely made of wood (for simplicity of construction and modification) and then painted to appear concrete and bricks: if this is usefull to contain the construction costs, also increases the risk of fire also for a simple spark. In both fires, most of the buildings of the backlot went destroyed, leading to the need of having to rebuild. The good thing is that, in both fires, the main building (the Courthouse) has never been destroyed! But now we can start to analyze the pictures found on the Internet.

   Below you can see how it looks like the set of the Courthouse in 1990, after a security guard hanged voluntarily fire, causing damage amounting to 25 million dollars. The security guard was later arrested and put in jail for 4 years. As you can see from the picture, the Courthouse was not involved by the fire, but all the adjacent buildings were flattened.

   From this picture it's possible to see that even some classic cars were destroyed by the fire. These cars were parked in the set of New York, at the back of the set of the Courthouse. In the box you can see an image of the Courthouse, fortunately without damage.

   Another image shows that the Courthouse miraculously escaped the fire and the various emergency vehicles intent to extinguish the fire and to render assistance. Fortunately no one was hurt.

   From this angle you can see that the building of the Courthouse reported no damage, just some sign on the fake sidewalls.

   Below the plant of the backlot showing (the area highlighted in red) the buildings affected by fire in 2008. Again, the Courthouse has miraculously escaped the fire but damage were the buildings of the set of New York and Los Angeles, the pavilion of King Kong and a warehouse containing about 40000 film, but for which there were copies.

   In this image you can see in the center the building of the Courthouse, while around the other buildings were involved in the fire.

   Some emergency vehicles stop in after turning off the fire. In the upper right you can see the building of the Courthouse.

   In the following picture, after the fire of 2008, you can see the reconstruction of the backlot. You can see the wood frames of every buildings.

   Another picture where you can see the reconstruction of the backlot. Even here you can see the wide use of wood that is done in this type of construction.

   The next image was shoot by me during my visit to Universal Studios in April/May 2009. As you can see the reconstruction of the set was already at a good point, but unfortunately the area was not open. It will mean that I'll have to go back!

   Finally, here is an animation obtained with two images taken before and after the fire of 2008, where you can see the number of buildings that were destroyed during this fire.