Elyria apartment fire displaces 30 residents

ELYRIA — No injuries were reported, but roughly 30 people were left without a home after an Elyria apartment building was gutted by fire on Friday. Elyria firefighters were dispatched to the Southwyck Apartments on West River Road North at around 5 p.m. for a report of a fire on a deck at 1452 West River Road North. Spurred on by strong winds, the fire spread quickly from a middle unit to all 12 units in the two story apartment building, Fire Chief Joe Pronesti said. "With the wind it got up and it ran between the mansard (sloped roof covering the top floor of the apartment) and the interior wall and just ran in both directions of the apartment complex," Pronesti said. The fire was also swept across the roof by the wind, but Pronesti said that the roof consisted of layers of tar on top of plywood, which trapped fire inside. Firefighters were forced to cut holes into the roof to extinguish the fire, a painstaking process that was largely what kept firefighters at the scene for more than two hours. Firefighters from Elyria and Sheffield were initially on the roof at about 5:30 p.m., but were temporarily forced off by the rapidly spreading blaze. After a sustained attack on the fire through the interior of the apartments, firefighters were able to get back on the roof to snuff out the flames trapped inside. "They did a hell of a job, an absolutely fantastic job," Pronesti said of his firefighters. "I don't recall having a fire with this kind of wind in many years. This crew was under the direction of Assistant Chief Kevin Szabo, he did a phenomenal job leading them and they did a great job." Pronesti said that the cost of the damage to the entire building and the possessions inside was likely at least between $300,000 and $500,000. While smoke and fire damage varied between units, most were heavily damaged and the entire building was left uninhabitable by a loss of power. "We have about 30 people that are homeless," Pronesti said. The Red Cross, which arrived at the scene just as fire crews were wrapping up the scene, will assist those displaced residents with housing. A crowd of at least 100 people gathered as residents filed out of neighboring buildings and friends and relatives of those who lived in the burning building arrived. Extensive mutual aid was provided by the fire departments of Sheffield, Elyria Township, Eaton Township, Carlisle Township and Lorain. LifeCare Ambulance was also at the scene, and Elyria police arrived to provide assistance using the department's drone. A drone was flown above the burning building and its thermal imaging was used to detect hot spots in the roof of where the fire was still burning. Pronesti said the technology was a massive help and he would speak with Police Chief James Welsh about deploying it to more fires in the future. "EPD came with their drone and that helped tremendously because we were able to see all the hotspots," Pronesti said." We went to each section and cut right where he was showing, otherwise we would have been here all night." The cause of the fire is still under investigation. Contact Owen MacMillan at (440) 329-7123 or omacmillan@chroniclet.com