Columbus Fire Department photos.
COLUMBUS, Indiana — It will be days before any of the 15 displaced tenants in a Quail Run Apartments building damaged by fire will be able to return to their homes, the property manager said.
Eight of the building’s 16 units at 1152 Kevin Drive were affected by a Thursday night fire, three of them sustaining fire damage, Columbus Fire Department spokesman Lt. Mike Wilson said.
“At least two of them will have to be completely renovated,” Ashley Knight, property manager for the 16-building Quail Run complex, said Friday.
Four second-floor tenants were rescued at the east side complex, located at 10th Street and North Gladstone Avenue, but the fire left an estimated $225,000 in structural damage and $50,000 more in loss of contents, Wilson said.
Columbus firefighters were called to the apartment building around 10 p.m. Thursday, where they discovered heavy black smoke that originated from a first-floor unit that was spreading to the second floor, Wilson said.
Firefighters witnessed two occupants on the balcony of Apartment 2A. With the stairway exit blocked by flames, firefighters instructed the occupants to retreat back into the apartment and go to a window located farthest from the flames. Rescue personnel placed a ground ladder in an apartment window, and safely rescued Jeff Foley and his teen daughter Alison, Wilson said.
Two additional occupants from the building were trapped on a balcony at the rear of the fire building, Wilson said. Rescuers arrived at the balcony of Apartment 2B, and found Tevis McCammon and his teen daughter Sidney. Both were brought down safely and moved away from the building, Wilson said.
The fire started on the first floor in Apartment 1D, which had working smoke alarms, he said. As firefighting crews prepared to enter building, fire conditions inside the apartment intensified, Wilson said.
Outside the apartment, firefighters were approached by Sharessa Burton, who stated that she believed her husband was still inside Apartment 1D. But with the assistance of Columbus Police Department officers, the adult female was escorted away from the building to ensure her personal safety. As officers spoke to the female, her husband — whose name was not immediately available — was located safe in the apartment complex parking lot, Wilson said.
Cause of the fire has not yet been determined.
Read more details in Saturday’s print edition of The Republic.
Republic staff photo
