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Springdale Borough High-Rise Evacuated Due To Small Fire, Smoke

SPRINGDALE BOROUGH (KDKA) – Crews were called to Springdale Borough Thursday morning for a report of small fire in a high-rise.

The call initially came in as smoke on the sixth floor of Springdale Manor around 5:45 a.m. The building is located in the 500 block of Pittsburgh Street.

A 72-year-old man who uses a wheelchair was in bed when the fire broke out in his apartment. Firefighters were able to rescue the man, but had to use thermal technology in order to find him. He was taken to the hospital for treatment.

According to the fire chief, a lit candle in the apartment ignited the fire, which then spread into the furniture. The man tried to put out the fire before the sprinklers went off.

The sprinkler system doused the flames, but several apartments suffered water damage.

The building is an Allegheny County Housing Authority high-rise. Many of the residents are elderly or disabled. Because of the significant water damage, all of the residents were evacuated and are in limbo until damages are assessed.

"Six, five, four, all the way down. It's all flooded. The elevators are running with water," Joyce Bash said.  "My cupboards on the first floor are full, my kitchen full, the living room rug."

Bash lives in a first floor apartment. It didn't take long for water to reach her apartment.

"I grabbed my medicines. And I'm on a breathing machine. I just grabbed what I needed," she said.

Officials say the sprinkler system was on for about 30 minutes and was pumping water at about 60 gallons a minute. The pressure in the sprinkler system gave crews a difficult time.

"It was making it impossible to shut them off at the heads. We had to go to the fire pump and shut it down," Springdale Fire Department Assistant Chief Dan Copeland said. "We had three to four inches of water on the sixth floor and just as much on some of the floors below."

A bus was brought in to take about a dozen residents to a shelter near the Springdale Fire Department.

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