Fire in kitchen, no one injured
A Tuesday evening fire started by unattended food left on the stove destroyed the kitchen in a Valparaiso apartment but nobody was injured, according to a fire official.
Shortly before 7 p.m. Tuesday, firefighters were called to a two-story apartment building in the 1000 block of McCord Road, Lt. Robert Schulte, the Valparaiso Fire Department’s public information officer, said in a release.
Firefighters found heavy smoke coming from the four-unit building. Occupants had evacuated the building before the fire department arrived.
Firefighters found the kitchen area of a downstairs apartment on fire and quickly extinguished
the fire with less than 100 gallons of water, officials said.
The fire was reported as a result of an activated pull alarm in the building’s hallway. The occupant of the apartment where the fire occurred told officials she was cooking on the stove when she left the stove unattended to check on her child in another room and found the cabinets on fire when she returned to the kitchen, officials said.
A neighbor in the apartment complex entered through the patio door in an attempt to put the fire out with a fire extinguisher but was unsuccessful, Schulte said, adding no one was injured.
The Valparaiso Fire
Department Investigation Bureau investigated the fire. The cause was determined to be unattended cooking and accidental in nature. No activated smoke alarms were found in the apartment where the fire took place, Schulte said.
The fire department, Schulte said, would like to remind Valparaiso and Center Township residents that in the event of a fire: evacuate the building; close the doors upon exit to control the fire’s spread; call 911 when safely evacuated; and never reenter the building for any reason, especially to attempt to extinguish a fire.