July 22--Two men were killed in a fire in a four-story building in the city's Mount Vernon neighborhood early Monday morning, according to the Baltimore Fire Department.
Firefighters responded to the building in the 800 block of Park Avenue, on the neighborhood's northern border with Mid-Town Belvedere, just before 3:30 a.m. and reported heavy smoke and fire, the department said.
The first floor was on fire, while smoke was also showing from the second and third floors, said Capt. Roman Clark, a department spokesman.
Both men were found in the basement of the building amid utilities and supplies for the Da Vinci's market, located on the first floor, and transported to a local hospital, where they were pronounced dead, the department said.
They are the 12th and 13th fire-related deaths in the city this year. A total of 12 people died in fires all of last year.
Both men had initially been referred to by the department as "residents" of the building, but Clark said that remains unclear, as the department is still awaiting identification.
It is also unclear how many of the apartments located on the floors above Da Vinci's were occupied, Clark said.
The initial call came in to the department's dispatch center at 3:22 a.m., and the first unit arrived on scene at 3:26 a.m., Clark said. The fire was placed under control at 3:49 a.m.
There were working smoke alarms in the building, which were sounding when firefighters arrived, Clark said.
On Sunday, a woman was killed in a fire in an apartment building in Southwest Baltimore, while another was critically injured in a fire at the Gilmore Homes public housing project on Sunday evening.
The fire remains under investigation. No other injuries were reported.
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