Fire Kills 5 in Building Near College in Maine - New York Times ~ Google News

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Fire Kills 5 in Building Near College in Maine - New York Times

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U.S. |Fire Kills 5 in Building Near College in Maine

http://nyti.ms/1zWTIFO

Friends of one of the victims in the fire consoled each other outside the gutted apartment building on Saturday in Portland, Me. Robert F. Bukaty/Associated Press

A three-alarm fire swept through a duplex building in Portland early Saturday morning, killing five people and critically injuring one, in what the authorities said was the deadliest house fire in the state in 30 years.

The fire broke out in one of the apartments in the building, near the campus of the University of Southern Maine, said Steve McCausland, a spokesman for the state Department of Public Safety. The tenants had held a Halloween party in the unit on Friday, he said. Seven people escaped without injury, but two or three people remained unaccounted for on Saturday evening, he said.

Mr. McCausland said the fire was the deadliest in Maine since a fire that killed five people in Hartland in 1984.

Firefighters responded to the fire at around 7:15 a.m. at 20-24 Noyes Street, after receiving calls from several neighbors, Mr. McCausland said. None of the victims were believed to be students at the university, but officials would not know for sure until the bodies had been identified, he said.

The fire burned for more than an hour before firefighters were able to get it under control, he said. Fire marshals searched the home and found two bodies on the second floor and three bodies on the third floor, Mr. McCausland said.

All of the victims were pulled from one apartment. The missing people were guests at the Halloween party who might have stayed over or left during the night, Mr. McCausland said.

A man in his 20s who was badly burned escaped by jumping through a second-story window, Mr. McCausland said. The man was flown to a hospital in Boston, where he was listed in critical condition, he said.

It remained unclear how the fire started. The search for victims was expected to go until early Sunday, and then fire and police investigators are expected to focus on pinpointing the cause, Mr. McCausland said.

Pictures and video from the scene showed a white house with a charred exterior and a hole in the roof.

In an interview with The Portland Press Herald, Nathan Long said he was one of five tenants who lived in the apartment. He said he smelled smoke when his alarm woke him at 7 a.m. When he did not hear a smoke or fire alarm, he said, he yelled â€œFire!â€ then jumped out of a window at the back of the house.

â€œI feel pretty lucky,â€ he told the newspaper. â€œIâ€™m kind of numb.â€

Carol Schiller, the president of the neighborhood organization, told the newspaper that the property was run down with debris littering the ground outside. She said she had asked the city to inspect it, but did not know if anyone had visited the home.

The building is a two-story, two-unit duplex with a finished attic and a full basement, according to the Portland Assessorâ€™s online records. It was built in 1920.

The buildingâ€™s owner, Gregory Nisbet, is a realtor who lives about 300 yards away on Noyes Street. He did not answer or return a call seeking comment on Saturday.

Some friends of those who lived in the house gathered at the Great Lost Bear, a restaurant nearby on Forest Avenue. A hostess who answered the phone on Saturday did not give her name, but said the workers knew the victims and were in a somber mood.

â€œThey were really like a second family to us,â€ she said. â€œWeâ€™re all just sitting around the bar seats hoping for good news.â€