MN Apartment Fire Displaces Dozens

WELLS — An apartment building in Wells was severely damaged in a fire Saturday morning.

The approximately 20 people who were inside of the Wellington Estates apartment building at the time of the fire were able to exit the building safely, said Wells police officer Eric Neubauer. Flames from the top of the facility were visible when he arrived on scene after being called at about 7:17 a.m., he said.

Apartment resident Elaine Grunzke said she was inside the apartment when the fire started.

“And then my neighbor guy come over and knocked on my door, and I said, ‘You know, something don’t smell right.’ And he said, ‘No, we better check this out.’ And we went down, just right down in the hallway from my room, and there was, like, two brown spots on the ceiling, and he said, ‘I’m calling the Fire Department,’ so then he did. And the Fire Department come right away, and the cop was here, and (the fire) all tore loose.”

Grunzke said they knocked on doors to help people leave the building safely, and she expects the building to have substantial smoke damage.

Thirty to 35 people live in the apartment building, Neubauer said. The building — at 400 4th Ave. SW — formerly housed the now-closed Wells Hospital.

Grunzke said she was upset.

“This building was a hospital, and nobody has ever seen a fire at this place since they rebuilt this into apartments, and my apartment is gone,” she said. “The whole roof is gone.”

The cause of the fire has not been determined, and the State Fire Marshal’s Office was en route to the scene after the fire, Neubauer said.

The American Red Cross and more than a half dozen fire departments were on scene at about 9 a.m.

Look to the Tribune for more information as it is released.

———

©2017 the Albert Lea Tribune (Albert Lea, Minn.)

Visit the Albert Lea Tribune (Albert Lea, Minn.) at www.albertleatribune.com

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.