By Moustafa Ayad
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Copyright 2007 P.G. Publishing Co.
Clutching a plastic bag containing her pajamas, Carole Clarry walked through the smoke and the frigid air last night at the King’s Grant condominiums in Scott, feeling like one of the lucky ones.
Right next door to where Ms. Clarry has called home for almost a year, a fast-moving three-alarm fire tore through a set of condos, destroying 20 units and causing upward of $2 million of damage in a little more than four hours.
Ms. Clarry, whose condo sustained smoke and water damage, said, “I was real scared. Thank you. Thank you.”
The building next door, 1000 Chatham Park Drive, was little more than a shell, still smoldering and collapsing in the aftermath of the blaze. Ten units in the building were destroyed by fire and 10 more by smoke and water.
Firefighters from nearly a dozen companies worked through a single-digit wind chill in shifts last night, battling the fire and hose problems caused by the cold. Miraculously, Glendale Fire Chief Tom Salerno said, no residents or firefighters were injured.
“It was real tough and real cold,” he said. “Everything is freezing on you. Your lines are freezing on you and your men have to work in shifts because of the cold, and on top of that, to have no injuries is very uncommon.”
The chief said the fire started in a unit on the second floor around 3:42 p.m., spreading to the roof before it “completely gutted” the second floor. He said it was unclear how the fire started. The Allegheny County fire marshal was investigating last night.
“It was a total loss,” said Chief Salerno. Firefighters were able to stop the fire from spreading next door.
Brenda Stanton, who lived in a building behind where the fire started, said when she saw the flames she instantly thought of an elderly woman who lived on the second floor. She said firefighters managed to rescue the woman, in her 90s.
“I just thought of my own grandmother,” said Ms. Stanton.
The American Red Cross was assisting three adults displaced by the fire last night.
With temperatures in the low 20s, residents were taken to a nearby pool house, where they were safe from the cold. A Port Authority bus destined for the Collier Garage was rerouted and sent to be a mobile warming unit for emergency responders and whomever else needed refuge.
Renee Barbati, 23, had moved into her one-bedroom condo in September.
As she stood outside, unable to get past the line of firefighters still pouring water over the smoke coming from her unit, strangers stopped to tell her she would be in their prayers tonight.
Burying her head in her hands, she sobbed and said, “Thank you.”