An Oceanside resident’s decision to heat up a late-night meal caused a fire that evacuated an apartment complex and damaged six homes early Wednesday.
A pot overflowing on the stove started a fire around midnight in a downstairs unit in the Villa Del Rey apartment complex on Grant Street in Oceanside.
The residents tried to put the fire out with water. That move spread the fire to the rest of the kitchen, firefighters said. When they realized the fire was out of control, they gathered up their four children and got out.
Oceanside police officers evacuated residents from the complex before firefighters arrived.
Resident Jacqline Ibanez was just going to sleep when she heard screaming. "I looked out the window and I see the window is all on fire," Ibanez said. The teenager said she ran out of the room and told her mother the units were on fire.
When the Oceanside Fire Department arrived, the fire had engulfed the apartment and was quickly spreading upwards out several windows towards the units upstairs, according to firefighters.
Paramedics treated three police officers and five civilians for smoke inhalation and cuts caused by broken glass, according to firefighters. None needed to be hospitalized.
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Of the ten units in the complex, four units were damaged or destroyed in the fire. Two other units are uninhabitable because electrical and gas lines serving those units were damaged in the fire.
Thirty-two people will need a place to stay. Of them, 18 are children. The American Red Cross will help them find a place to stay.
Firefighters responded within five minutes of the original call, according to a fire department news release.
