Five people died, 13 were injured and 23 were displaced from their homes in an early-morning fire at an apartment building in downtown Las Vegas on Saturday, according to Las Vegas Fire and Rescue.
Local media accounts report varying numbers of fatalities, but an 8 a.m. Facebook post from the fire department said five people died and that the incident was under investigation.
FIre department spokesman Tim Szymanski said at 4:13 a.m. firefighters responded to a two-alarm fire at the Alpine Motel Apartments, where they found residents hanging and jumping from second-floor windows, and trying to escape using sheets.
Szymanski said the fire appears to have originated in the kitchen in one of the units. Residents told investigators that the building did not have heat and that they had been using their kitchen stoves as a heat source.
According to Szymanski, 10 people were taken to area hospitals by ambulance and three others traveled to the hospital on their own. Five people, one of them a pregnant woman, were in critical condition.
A witness told Fox 5 Vegas several of the residents were women and children and described the neighborhood as a “close-knit community.”
Two cats and one dog died in the fire, and one dog was rescued by animal control.
The American Red Cross of Nevada was assisting those affected in the fire.
Szymanski estimated damage to the building at $475,000.
UPI
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