The fire started about 2115 - 2120 by a candle in the first floor
apartment #115 on Saturday, September 21, 1991. (See Floor Plan in
Appendix A.) The tenant, a 22-year old mother of three children under
age seven, had had her electricity shut off ten days earlier. She ‘borrowed’
electricity several times from a neighbor using an extension cord, but on
the night of the fire the neighbor refused and the mother resorted to using
a candle for light after coming home with her children to a dark
apartment.
The candle was placed in a plate on a dresser in her bedroom. As
the candle burned down, the mother kept the fire going by feeding it with
some paper envelopes. When the fire flared up, she tried to blow it out,
which caused flaming debris to scatter. A piece of flaming paper fell
behind the dresser and ignited something on the floor -- probably clothing
or the rug. (Clothes were scattered about the floor, and remnants were
found by the dresser.)
The tenant tried to extinguish the fire with water unsuccessfully for
a period of time, then brought her three children out to her car. She
called out to people in the parking lot outside her apartment that there
was a fire and to get some water. At least one man tried to fight the fire
with a bucket of water. She did not call the fire department. After the
fire blew out the bedroom window, she drove off in her car, almost out of
control. She struck a car in the parking lot several times but continued.
A search by police and fire officials found her two days later hiding with
relatives. She described how the fire started to investigators.
Next » Fire Detection and Reporting
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