Twenty-nine residents of an Elgin apartment building have been displaced after a fire gutted their homes Tuesday afternoon.
At 2:45 pm Tuesday, members of the Elgin Fire Department responded to the 1800 block of Mark Avenue for a report of a possible structure fire.
Responding companies found a three story, multi-unit residential structure with smoke showing from the second and third floor windows and the roof. Fire crews deployed multiple hose lines to the second and third floors and extinguished a fire that had extended from a second-floor unit to a third-floor unit.
Upon discovering fire in the walls extending throughout the second and third floors, the alarm was upgraded, bringing eleven assisting agencies in from neighboring cities.
The fire was brought under control approximately seventeen minutes after the arrival of the Fire Department and crews continued to extinguish small hidden fires for approximately one hour. Multiple residences suffered extensive damage from water and smoke rendering all six units uninhabitable. Initial damage estimates are in excess of $400,000.
There were no firefighter injuries and one civilian was assessed for minor injuries but refused transport. One cat was successfully rescued from an apartment. All twenty-nine residents of the building have been displaced by the fire and have been housed through the efforts of the fire department, Hanover Township Emergency Services and the American Red Cross. The cause of the fire is under investigation by the Elgin Fire Department Fire Investigation Team and believed to involve plumbing work being done in a bathroom wall.
