Here’s how an early-morning phone call helped save lives in a Pasco fire

An early-morning phone call may have saved the lives of residents when a fire broke out Saturday in a Pasco apartment complex.

A resident at the Tri-Cities Vista Affordable Housing complex called property manager Adelita Alvarado around 2:30 a.m. to say something was going on at the building and she needed to get out there.

Alvarado heard there may have been a fight in one of the upstairs apartments in the six-unit building. As she walked up, she saw the smoke coming from the apartment.

“So I ran down to get a fire extinguisher, and I broke the glass and I got the fire extinguisher,” she said. “I was going to go inside, but there was just too much smoke.”

It was then that Alvarado started to knock on people’s doors and get them out. She got the ones away who responded, then ran back to her home and got the master key and started opening doors.

Along with helping evacuate families from the six-unit building, Alvarado called 911 to report the fire.

The fire tore through one of the upstairs apartments, leaving heavy smoke and fire damage. Smoke and water damaged two others, with four apartments total without power as of Saturday afternoon.

Pasco firefighters and police officers Matt Griffin and Joe Mullen helped with the evacuation efforts. Firefighters were able to save a cat from one of the apartments, but another died in the course of the fire.

Pasco was joined by Franklin County Fire District 3 and Walla Walla County Fire District 5 in fighting the fire.

Complex owner Robert Hutson woke up around 2:40 a.m. to a phone call from Alvarado. He said that when he arrived, the small lane to the building was packed with fire trucks as they worked hours extinguishing the blaze.

Firefighters were on the scene until 10 a.m. making sure the fire hadn’t spread to any of the neighboring apartments.

The cause of the fire is under investigation.

Nine people including thee children were displaced by the fire. Hutson said they were either staying with relatives or moved into other units.

While the complex is home to 48 units set aside for rental assistance, the six units affected were full price.

This story was originally published January 6, 2018 at 4:28 PM with the headline "Here’s how an early-morning phone call helped save lives in a Pasco fire."