Pa. Firefighters Rescue Woman From Apartment Blaze

A downtown Allentown fire that broke out just before midnight Wednesday damaged a second-floor apartment as city firefighters rescued a woman on the floor above.

The blaze was reported at 11:55 p.m. Above the Angelo's Tailoring storefront at 1124 W. Hamilton St., smoke billowed from the second floor of the brick building.

"I was asleep when I heard all this commotion," said neighbor Leon Wilson of 1118 W. Hamilton St. as he watched the firefighters from across Hamilton Street. "There was mass smoke coming from that building."

Wilson said he knows the woman who lives on the third floor of 1124 Hamilton, and he was happy the firefighters reached her quickly when smoke was filling her apartment.

"She was yelling out the window, 'Help, help! Help, help!'" city fire Capt. Scott Henrick said. "So we went up the fire escape and we brought her down the fire escape."

Within 4 minutes, firefighters had her safely out of the building. She was tentatively identified as Felisha Davila. Neither she nor the building's other residents were hurt.

The fire initially was thought to be on Maple Street, the alley just south of Hamilton Street. Maple Street neighbors smelled the smoke that was leaving the rear of 1124 Hamilton St.

Henrick said the fire started in a second-floor rear bedroom. The man who lived there may be the only resident displaced by the fire, he said. Flames did not reach the other apartments.

The first-floor tailor business also was not damaged.

Firefighters doused the flames within 10 minutes, Henrick said, but fire crews remained at the scene more than an hour to look for hot spots. A fire marshal stayed longer to look for the cause of the fire.

Firefighters approached the fire from the front and rear, as police shut down Hamilton and Maple streets between 11th and 12th streets. The streets were reopened at 1:20 a.m.

Copyright 2012 - The Morning Call, Allentown, Pa.

McClatchy-Tribune News Service