St. Paul apartment fire leaves dozens displaced, building to be demolished

Our top story tonight, a St. Paul apartment building is scheduled to be demolished in just 12 hours. It comes less than 24 hours after a devastating fire that caused its roof to collapse. Thanks for joining us on Fox 9 and Fox Local. I'm Randy Meyer. And I'm Kelsey Carlson. The fire left dozens of residents displaced. Our Maury Glover spoke to some and joins us live now. So, Maury, this was a tragic loss for so many people. Well that's right firefighters are still on the scene at this hour and they'll most likely be here all night while residents try and figure out their next steps. The word that feels like it comes to heart mostly is devastated. Maddie Myers is heartbroken over the loss of her apartment and just about everything she owns. The only items she escaped with are her phone, her cat and the clothes on her back. I'm remembering everything else I should have grabbed and that's really hard. Because I got out so soon that I'm kicking myself. Residents of the Randolph Terrace Apartments say they smelled smoke just after 8 Monday morning. By the time firefighters arrived, they discovered a fire in the attic of the four-story building, forcing the occupants of the 20 apartments to get out, leaving most of their belongings like baby clothes behind. You know, like her cow pajamas, like she first started to say moo when we put the cow pajamas on, or she has this little fox and hound. After we watched the movie, and she's only 15 months, and she'd carry him around. Yeah, it was just, so that type of stuff. At one point, the roof collapsed, and crews had to battle the blaze from the outside because the building wasn't safe to enter. Investigators haven't determined the exact cause of the fire, but residents believe it was electrical in nature. The lights all night were dimming, like every light. At first I thought it was my apartment. I go outside, and it was... The alley light or whatever, and even the hallway lights, they were just dimming and then coming back, dimming and coming back. Myers will stay at her parents' house while facing an uncertain future. It feels like my life has been halted in the worst way. Now, luckily no one was injured in this fire, but firefighters had to evacuate the buildings on both sides of the fire, and there's no word when those residents will be allowed back into their apartments. In the meantime, the Randolph Terrace Apartments is scheduled to be demolished at 8 o'clock tomorrow morning. Reporting live in St. Paul, Maury Glover, Fox 9.