Murray apartment fire displaces 100, kills pets

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MILLCREEK — An apartment fire in Murray temporarily displaced about 100 people Monday night and destroyed six units, Unified Fire Authority said.

Crews arrived on scene shortly before 6 p.m. to find heavy smoke and flame coming from a second-floor unit of a three-story building at Driftwood Park Apartments, located in the area of 3900 South and 700 West, according to Unified fire spokesman Keith Garner.

He described the blaze as a two-alarm fire.

An estimated 100 tenants from 24 apartment units were evacuated with the help of Unified police, Garner said. He said it was likely that the displaced residents would not be able to get back into their apartments until Tuesday.

Six apartment units in the building are a complete loss, Garner said, with an estimated $500,000 worth of damage. Several others had smoke damage, he said.

No residents or firefighters were injured, but two pet rabbits, three birds, and a rat were unaccounted for, said Jana Scanlon, the mother of one tenant. Scanlon said her daughter only had time to get her dog out safely.

“She doesn’t know what happened,” Scanlon said of her daughter. “Somebody just started pounding on the door and said, ‘You need to get out.’”

Scanlon said that when she heard about the fire, she rushed to the scene.

“I drove like 60 miles an hour here, and I only live up the street,” Scanlon said. “I parked like two blocks up the street and just ran the rest of the way here.”

The cause of the fire is under investigation. Garner said Monday night that fire investigators believe the blaze started in one of the second-floor apartments, but it’s too early to tell exactly where or how the fire began.