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One dead, two injured after 2-alarm fire at apartment complex in West Jordan

Posted at 3:46 PM, Aug 06, 2017
and last updated 2017-08-06 17:47:49-04

WEST JORDAN, Utah -- One woman is dead and an estimated 11 to 14 people are displaced after a fire at Daybreak Hills Condos in Murray Sunday afternoon.

The call came in at 3:11 p.m. and West Jordan Fire Department Battalion Chief Bryan Crump said it took emergency crews just four minutes to respond.

In that short time, resident Brandon Edick and his roommate tried to help save lives.

“We were just talking around the kitchen table," Edick said. "We heard one loud bang. We didn’t really think too much anything of it. Fireworks going off all the time lately. Construction over there, but then we heard another one."

He and his roommate banged on doors to notify neighbors of the blaze.

Meanwhile, he said saw the tenants on the second floor of the building running back and forth on the walkway. He said they could not run down the stairs because it was already going up in flames.

Those two, a man and woman, had to jump. Crump said the woman broke both her arms and the man suffered back and neck injuries, plus some scrapes. They were taken to the hospital and are expected to recover fully.

The downstairs tenant, a woman age 60-65 died.

“I was just wondering if everybody got out OK, that was my main concern," said Karl Ostberg, a resident of the complex. "The building can be replaced; people can’t."

Crump said he believes the whole building will be uninhabitable. The roof and ceilings collapsed in many of the condos. There are eight condos in the building, six of which were heavily damaged by fire, the other two by smoke.

Sunday night, investigators were still not able to go inside the building for safety reasons. They are working on stabilizing the building.

The Red Cross is providing immediate assistance and potential lodging for those affected.