Carmichaels apartment fire injures two, displaces dozens
Two residents, including a 12-year-old boy, were injured during an apartment fire early Friday morning in Carmichaels.
Carmichaels and Cumberland Township firefighters were dispatched at 1:41 a.m. to the Parkview Knoll Apartments on Ceylon Road. When they arrived, flames were showing at the rear of the building in apartment 111, according to fire Chief Jim Higgins.
“A woman jumped out a window before we got the ladder up,” he said.
She suffered an ankle injury, but Higgins was unsure if she was transported to a hospital. The 12-year-old, he said, was found lying unconscious in a hallway of the building.
“He was carried down by a fireman,” Higgins said.
The boy was given oxygen by EMS crews, Higgins said, and was conscious when he was flown by helicopter to UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh for smoke inhalation injuries.
Higgins said firefighters rescued about seven people from the second floor of the building by bringing them through windows and down ladders.
“A couple people said they couldn’t see their way to get out of the building,” Higgins said. “Some just felt their way along walls to get to a hallway. The smoke was really bad in there.”
Higgins said there are 24 units in the building, 23 of which were occupied. Two of the apartments were destroyed and the others were damaged by smoke, he said.
Higgins said they had enough manpower and water to put out the fire, but much of the work they did that morning, aside from rescues, was ventilating smoke. Assisting at the scene were Cumberland Township police and firefighters from Nemacolin, Rices Landing, Crucible, Jefferson and Greensboro. EMS crews from Southwest, Jefferson and Fayette also responded.
The Red Cross also responded, Higgins said, by taking about 17 residents from the scene. There were many more residents displaced who likely stayed with friends or family, he said.
Lisa Landis, spokesperson for the Red Cross, said the initial number their teams were given at the scene this morning was about 45 people displaced, but they don’t have a final count yet.
“We have teams on the ground working with the displaced families,” Landis said Friday. “It’s a pretty major response, and it sounds as if it will be an ongoing response. Our numbers will increase throughout the day as we make contact with these residents.”
As of Friday afternoon, the Red Cross was assisting about 30 residents who are staying at a Uniontown hotel.
“Following COVID-19 guidance, Red Cross teams are responding to the needs of the community while following social distance guidelines, implementing personal protective equipment and sanitizing procedures,” Landis wrote in a news release.
She said anyone in need of assistance as a result of this fire can contact the Red Cross at 800-422-7677.