Chelsea was on fire again. Already the scene of one of the biggest fires in the history of the country in 1908, the city was engulfed anew on October 14, 1973. A new inferno had begun just a few hundred yards from the original fire. The scope of the conflagration is difficult to imagine, with 18 city blocks burned right down to the ground. Over 600 people lost their jobs when businesses went up in flames along with homes as over 300 buildings burned. Help from 67 Massachusetts fire departments poured into Chelsea, and with a mile-long area on fire, there was plenty of work to go around. No one was killed. Lane Turner and Lisa Tuite

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  bill brett/globe staff/file 1973

  Oct. 14, 1973: View from the Mystic River Bridge as fire raced through Chelsea. Box 215, the same box which sounded the alarm for the Chelsea fire of 1908 was pulled from the street at 3:56 p.m. "We've got a working fire. Heavy smoke, Arlington and Third Street," was the next transmission, from Lieutenant Ernest Copello of Chelsea's Engine 5 - the first man on the scene. Just minutes later Chelsea Fire Chief Herbert Fothergill declared the fire a conflagration.
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  david l. ryan/globe staff

  Oct. 14, 1973: Chelsea firemen fight the blaze at some junk shop businesses on Second Avenue. The fire devastated 18 city blocks and destroyed an estimated 303 buildings leaving more than 600 people unemployed.
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  Ted dully/globe staff

  Oct. 14, 1973: John White, district fire chief of Boston, got his eye treated as other firefighters lined up for aid. More than 2,000 firefighters from 85 communities converged on Chelsea to battle the fire.
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  bill brett/globe staff

  Oct. 14, 1973: The American Red Cross with volunteers from as far as Nashua, N.H. established headquarters at the Chelsea National Guard Armory to feed the homeless and the hundreds of firefighters, to offer medical care to the elderly, and to register displaced victims. By midnight 150 had settled in. Their homes were destroyed and they, unlike others, had no place else to go.
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  united press international

  Oct. 15, 1973: Smoke still rose from buildings that burned in the wind-swept fire that leveled 18 city blocks and destroyed an area 1 mile long and a half-mile wide in this historic port city.
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  Joseph Dennehy/globe staff

  Oct. 15, 1973: The day-after picture of the Great Chelsea Fire of 1973 showed the total devastation caused by the fire. The fire area was almost entirely within the perimeters of two urban renewal projects - a planned $14.6 million industrial park and a proposed $2.3 million residential project.
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  united press international

  Oct. 15, 1973: Skeletons of buildings remained standing in Chelsea as National Guardsmen patrolled the area to prevent looting.
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  Ted dully/globe staff

  Oct. 15, 1973: Mrs. William Meuse and her son Jim were burned out of their 125 Spruce St. home. They talked with with Philip Spelman, the mayor of Chelsea.
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  ted dully/globe staff

  Oct. 15, 1973: John Adams, 14, looked at the remains of his Vale Street home. Fire also swept the family's repair shop which was located next door.