Fire chief: 1 person died, 7 others homeless in New Kensington apartment fire

One person died and seven others were left homeless in a fire Wednesday evening at an apartment house in New Kensington.

Firefighters from New Kensington, Arnold, Lower Burrell, Upper Burrell and Plum responded to 1350 Kenneth Ave. shortly after 7:10 p.m. for reports of a fire at the three-story converted house with someone entrapped inside, officials said.

New Kensington Fire Chief Ed Saliba Jr. said one of his assistant chiefs lives nearby and confirmed the working fire, and firefighters at the main station downtown saw a black column of smoke.

“When the crews got on scene, we were notified by the residents in the area that there was confirmed entrapment,” Saliba said. “Firefighters stretched a line into the first floor, started to knock the fire down. There was heavy fire and a lot of heat in that first-floor, left side apartment. There was a good bit of fire that they had to knock down to get inside.”

Firefighters found the victim in that apartment.

In addition, a firefighter was taken to a hospital for heat exhaustion.

Bystanders Mystia Bryan and her aunt, Kendra Fouse, said they were a few blocks away when they heard an explosion.

“It sounded like dynamite went off,” Bryan said. “I thought they were destroying houses.”

The pair made their way to Kenneth Avenue and saw smoke coming from the building.

Former resident Karen Hussey moved out of the building at the end of May after having lived on the second floor almost two years. She said there were six apartments in the building and all were occupied when she left.

Saliba said crews were able to evacuate other residents and did all they could to save everyone.

“We risk a lot to save lives, and I can’t say enough about all the firefighters that were here this evening,” he said. “As our volunteers were making entry into the structure, we also had other firefighters that were laddering the building, venting the building, stretching additional lines, taking lines to the second and third floor to try to stop the spread of fire and make sure that everybody’s out of the structure.

“We probably had over 70 volunteer firefighters that broke their backsides to try to put a stop to the fire and to make sure that everybody was out. They did everything they could to get in there and make the save.”

Flames made it up the walls to the second and third floors.

“It’s an older building,” Saliba said. “The building was a frame structure, balloon-frame construction. It’s wooden clapboard siding with aluminum siding on top of it. The building’s been remodeled several times.”

Other neighboring departments covered New Kensington, Arnold and Lower Burrell while their crews were at the fire.

American Red Cross is assisting those displaced by the fire.

State police fire marshals and New Kensington detectives are investigating. The last crew began clearing the scene around 10:45 p.m.