One dead, six injured in Belltown apartment fire; 50 residents displaced
Jul 10, 2024, 7:02 AM | Updated: 2:25 pm
Birds eye view of SFD responding to a Belltown apartment fire. (Photo courtesy of Vine Court Apartments resident)
(Photo courtesy of Vine Court Apartments resident)
A two-alarm fire at an apartment building in Seattle’s Belltown neighborhood killed one person and injured another six, according to the Seattle Fire Department (SFD).
The fire started just after 2 a.m. Wednesday at the Vine Court Apartments, an affordable housing complex. SFD officials stated the fire started on the third floor of the building and spread to the fourth floor.
Among the six injured, one was taken to the hospital in “critical condition.”
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Firefighters are responding to a reported fire in a residential building in the 100 block of Vine St. Please avoid the area.
— Seattle Fire Dept. (@SeattleFire) July 10, 2024
“Somebody died and they said someone else who went to the hospital is not in good condition,” a resident of the complex said. “I was in there choking to death.”
Approximately 50 people needed to evacuate the building in total.
“It was a bit of a chaotic scene a lot of people trying to get out of the building there was heavy smoke and flames coming from the third floor,” SFD spokesperson Kaila Lafferty told KIRO Newsradio. “Some people had to be pulled from windows from the third and fourth floor, using ladder trucks and stuff like that. They were assisting people coming out of hallways. There was a lot of smoke.”
“I was getting ready to jump out the window,” one resident at Vince Court apartments said. “That’s how close (the fire) was to me.”
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The fire is now under control as crews remain at the scene. The Seattle Police Department (SPD) confirmed one person was arrested in connection with the fire. At 5:27 a.m., two SPD officers arrested one man, age 65, just outside the building in connection with the fire, but was later identified and released. As of Wednesday morning, officers said the man was being interviewed at a police precinct.
There is no information about a potential cause, as of this reporting. It was the third major fire overnight in Seattle, according to SFD.
Contributing: Sam Campbell and Luke Duecy, KIRO Newsradio
Frank Sumrall is a content editor at MyNorthwest. You can read his stories here and you can email him here.
