By Robert Mills
The Lowell Sun
WILMINGTON, Mass. — A two-unit apartment building was destroyed, a dog was killed and two cats were still missing last night as a fire left three people homeless just off Main Street in Wilmington.
Fire Chief Ed Bradbury said the blaze at 8 Church St. was first reported by a Wilmington police officer working a detail at about 1:30 p.m.
Crews arrived to find light smoke coming from the building, and were told all residents had escaped but that a dog and two cats were still believed to be inside.
The dog’s body was later found inside the building.
Firefighters initially attacked the flames inside the building, but soon realized it was unsafe.
“Pretty quickly we realized this thing was making a lot more headway than was going to be safe,” Bradbury said.
Crews surrounded the building and fought the fire from outside, a task made significantly easier by the town’s new aerial ladder truck, which went into service Dec. 8.
Bradbury said it appears the blaze started as a kitchen fire and quickly spread. Firefighters got the blaze under control by 2:42 p.m.
“They did a great job, and nobody got hurt,” Bradbury said.
Bradbury said the cold weather made the fire harder to fight, but that crews from the DPW were at the scene spreading sand and salt to help keep ice from building up, which helped the firefighters.
Debbie Duxbury, emergency director for the Merrimack Valley Chapter of the American Red Cross, said the Red Cross provided vouchers for food and clothing to three people in two families, and put one of the families in a local hotel. The other family was staying with friends.
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