When Josephine Rodriguez woke up for a drink of water early Friday morning, she thought that the bright orange light outside her window came from a nearby delivery truck. A whiff of smoke told her that the lights were actually coming from flames that were destroying the storage building next to her Clay Street home.

"I looked up and I saw the flames on top of the building," she said. "I'm surprised that nobody else saw it."

She called 911, grabbed her dog, Barry, and ran out of the house. At 1:58 a.m., fire crews from the city of Napa and Napa County/California Department of Forestry arrived at the 7,000 square-foot commercial storage structure on 2285 Clay St., and began an hour-long attack on the fire. The fire caused about $1 million worth of damage. No one was hurt.

City of Napa spokeswoman Paula O'Rourke said the blaze began at the northwest section of the building and destroyed its five separate storage units. More than 40 firefighters responded to the fire and kept it contained to the two-story structure.

As fire crews blasted the burn with water -- paint, water and other "unknown substances" trickled into Napa Creek, according to a city press release. The city called for mutual aid from the Napa Police and Public Works departments, PG&E, Caltrans, California Department of Fish and Game and the Napa County Environmental Management Department.

Work crews built a makeshift dam out of sandbags in the creek at Jefferson and Cedar streets and diluted the hazardous materials with water, O'Rourke said.

Dwayne Robertson, a local snack distributor who has stored his wares in the building since 1985, lost his product, a motorcycle and other items in the blaze.

"I'm probably essentially out of business," he said. "It's pretty much cleaned me out."

Robertson said he estimates his losses at $50,000. But, he said, "nobody got hurt, that's the good part." On Friday morning, Robertson was busy on the phone, talking to his insurance company about potential coverage of his losses.

Scott Klingbeil, the city's interim planning director, said the city would control whether the owner of the gutted structure could build another storage building.

Both the building and storage uses were inconsistent with current zoning, which calls for housing on the site, Klingbeil said. In today's market, housing is a more likely use of the property, he said.

If the owner wants to rebuild storage, neighbors will have their say at a Planning Commission use permit hearing, Klingbeil said. The commission would have to find that a new storage building would not be detrimental to the neighborhood, he said.

Police closed Clay Street between Monroe and Seymour streets, while fire crews bulldozed and pulled down what was left of the building Friday morning. No one was injured during the fire and its cause is under investigation.

Register Staff Writer Kevin Courtney contributed to this report.