As firemen battle one fire, second starts as items left on stove
Family members exit apartment on MLK after fire
While firefighters were battling one blaze inside an apartment on Martin Luther King Drive in Flomaton last Thursday, a second blaze broke out in another apartment with both being caused by items left on a stove.
The Flomaton Fire Department responded to a 911 call at 1:31 p.m. to 545 Martin Luther King Drive, Apartment 31, to find the apartment full of smoke and flames coming from the stove. The tenant, Herman Womack, said he had put something on the stove to cook and fell asleep. Womack suffered smoke inhalation and was transported to the hospital by ambulance.
Flomaton Fire Chief Steve Stanton said it took firemen about 15 minutes to get the blaze under control.
Stanton said about the time the first fire was extinguished, residents came running out of Apartment 22 across the drive, with one carrying a smoking pot that had also been left on the stove.
Firemen then responded to Apartment 22. Stanton said there was no blaze inside that apartment, but it did suffer a small amount of smoke damage.
He said Apartment 31 suffered extensive damage and smoke entered the next apartment over.
Firefighters from Flomaton and Century responded to the blaze. Stanton also said several of the junior firemen from Flomaton High School were at the fire station when the call came in and followed firemen to the scene to help.
