The D.C. fire marshal’s office is investigating a series of suspicious fires at a high-rise apartment building in Northwest Washington, officials said.
Four times in the last two weeks, firefighters have had to rush up the nine-story apartment building at 401 K St. N.W., to extinguish small blazes, according to fire officials. Three of the fires have come in the last three days, a spokesman said.
“It’s a situation that is very concerning,” said D.C. Fire and Emergency Medical Services spokesman Alan Etter. “The fire marshal is working to stop this before someone gets hurt.”
Management officials on Wednesday refused to comment about the incidents. The 300-unit apartment building, named the Museum Square One, is home to low-income people. Many residents are elderly or handicapped.
Theresa Burton, the president of the building’s tenants association, said she couldn’t get out of her first-floor apartment Sunday because the smoke was so thick she couldn’t see down the hallway. She placed a towel at the bottom of the door and waited out the emergency.
“We have an arsonist here. This is dangerous. Something is wrong,” Burton said. “We got seniors, people on oxygen, in walkers, canes and wheelchairs. They can’t move. They can’t get out.”
Nobody has been hospitalized so far, but one person was treated for respiratory problems Tuesday night, Etter said. All of the fires have occurred in public spaces within the building. One was started on furniture in the first-floor common area and three others occurred in the trashrooms in the fifth and sixth floors. Ninety-year-old Mae Browner lives on the fifth floor and uses a walker. She said she isn’t able to walk down the steps on her own.
“I believe someone is messing with us,” Browner said.
