ROME (AP) _ A fire broke out at a luxury hotel Saturday, killing three people and forcing the evacuation of tennis stars Andy Roddick, Marat Safin and other players in the Italian Open.
None of the players was injured, said Nicola Arzani, communications director for the ATP Tour.
The fire broke out at about 5:15 a.m. in Room 305 of the five-star Parco dei Principi hotel, police and fire officials said. Police took two American women, 24 and 25, in for questioning because the blaze started in their room, but said they were being treated as witnesses, not suspects.
Smoke and flames spread quickly throughout the floor and to other parts of the hotel.
One American man died after he tried to escape the fire by shimmying down his balcony using a bedsheet and slipped, police official Giuseppe Andruzzi said at a news conference. Firefighters found a Canadian couple dead in their bathroom, apparently after they suffocated from the smoke, he said.
The blaze and smoke forced the evacuation of the hotel's 350 guests, including the second-ranked Roddick of the United States, the Russian Safin, Mariano Zabaleta of Argentina and Max Mirnyi of Belarus.
Mirnyi was seen covering himself with a blanket outside the hotel in the early morning cold, wearing only shorts.
The Italian Open starts Monday, and nearly all the affected players had to rearrange their practice schedules, Arzani said.
``A lot of people lost equipment,'' Arzani said.
The American women taken in for questioning were permitted to leave Italy, Andruzzi said.
A U.S. Embassy spokesman said the women had spoken with a U.S. consular official.
Police and fire officials identified the dead as James Lawery, of Georgia, and Bernice Mary Joan Busque of Connors, Canada and Paul Emile Busque of Lac Frontier, Canada.
The U.S. Embassy spokesman said the wife of the dead American had survived the blaze.
