CT Firefighters Save About a Dozen from Apartment Fire

A Hartford apartment building fire Thursday forced firefighters to rescue about a dozen people, a fire official said. Ten were injured and at least 26 families were displaced.

The fire at 820 Wethersfield Ave, a 42-unit apartment building, was reported shortly before 7:20 a.m., when people were sleeping or getting ready for work or school. As firefighters arrived, they saw flames in a third-floor window, and residents in others frantically calling for help. Thick smoke kept them from leaving the building on their own, Deputy Chief Alvaro Cucuta said.

Firefighters leaned ladders against the brick building and took people out of second and third-floor windows.

“They saved lives today,” Cucuta said.

The fire had started on the second floor and spread to the third, he said. Fire officials called for a second team of firefighters and equipment at 7:25 a.m., shortly after arriving at the scene, and the fire was knocked down by 8 a.m.

Ten people—seven adults and three children—were taken to the hospital, nine of whom were suffering smoke inhalation. A few of them had minor burns, Cucuta said.

As of mid-afternoon, 57 people, 44 adults and 13 children, were displaced, but the number is expected to rise as people who weren’t there at the time of the fire arrive home. The department is working with the American Red Cross to find temporary housing, he said.

In addition to the bone-chilling cold, which froze water from the fire hoses, there were a number of challenges in fighting the fire and making the rescues, Cucuta said. The building is set back from the street on a narrow lot with a fence on both sides, and firefighters had a hard time getting their trucks close to the fire.

Resident Elisha Martorelli said she was in the shower when she heard the blaring smoke alarms. She got out and, without drying off, got dressed and left the apartment.

“I had to run through the smoke and I couldn’t breathe,” she said. Her face had soot on it.

The fire broke out two doors down from Heribertito Rodriguez, who said when he opened his apartment door there was “nothing but black smoke.”

“I panicked,” he said. He put his sneakers on – no time for socks – and “went straight for the window,” where workers from a nearby company rushed up with a ladder to help him down, he said.

Some displaced residents sat in a transit bus near the scene as others went to the nearby offices of Disability Rights Connecticut at 846 Wethersfield Ave.

The cause of the fire is being investigated.

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