Tallahassee fire officials said a cigarette is to blame for Tuesday morning’s fire at the Pine Lake apartments in Northeast Tallahassee, and more than 20 residents are now working to recover after the blaze.
The Red Cross has put the 23 displaced residents in a local hotel for three nights giving them time to find alternative housing. Lieutenant Mike Bellamy, with the Tallahassee Fire department, said the cost of the damage is close to one million dollars.
“We typically look at a value of each unit, in this case we looked at a hundred thousand dollar value on each of the units, and we had 8 units that were heavily affected by water, fire, or smoke; and you have the cost of the tear down of those units and rebuild,” Bellamy said.
Lt. Bellamy said it is unusual for so many units to be affected by one fire. A barking dog alerted one of the residents early Tuesday morning to the smoke coming from a nearby unit on the first floor. No people were injured during the incident.