Redlands Fire: Smoke Detector Helped Save Woman's Life

Redlands Fire Department officials credit a functioning fire detector with helping save the life of a woman who they said was momentarily trapped by a fire in her apartment.

The blaze was reported at 2:38 p.m. Sunday at an apartment complex in the 300 block of La Paloma Street in Redlands. Crews responding to the scene were initially told the flames had a woman was trapped inside an upstairs apartment unit, according to a Redlands Fire news release.

Crews later learned the woman had been in the shower when a smoke detector went off. Authorities said the detector, “gave her the extra seconds to make a safe exit from the burning apartment.”

As she tried to escape, the woman found fire blocked the front door. However the woman was able to leave unharmed through a second exit, officials said.

Firefighters knocked down the flames in less than 10 minutes but units remained on scene for nearly three hours to investigate. Crews were still working to determine the cause as of the blaze early Monday.

The American Red Cross assisted two women and one man displaced from the unit where the fire started and a woman and a man who were displaced from an apartment below that sustained water damage, officials said.

No one was injured on Sunday. Officials estimated the fire caused $75,000 in damages to the apartments and their contents.

“A working smoke detector and a second way out kept this fire from becoming a tragedy,” officials wrote in their news release. “Please remember to check your smoke detectors regularly and practice exit drills in the home.”