Man killed in New Year’s Day fire in Boone County
COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)
A man died early Wednesday when a fire broke out in a four-unit apartment building in Boone County just outside southwest Columbia.
The fire was reported a little before 4 a.m. at 4357 W. Bellview Drive. Firefighters found a man in the living room of an apartment and removed him from the home but he did not survive, said Boone County Fire Protection District spokesman Gale Blomenkamp. The fire started on the stove and made its way into the kitchen cabinets in the upstairs unit before it was extinguished.
Blomenkamp said the man's cause of death has not been determined but smoke inhalation is suspected. An autopsy will determine the cause of death.
The Columbia Fire Department sent eight companies with 21 firefighters to the scene as mutual aid, according to a CFD news release. It was those firefighters and MU Health Care paramedics who tried to resuscitate the man, the release says. Paramedics pronounced him dead about 35 minutes after he was removed from the apartment building.
No firefighters were hurt.
A downstairs neighbor reported the fire after hearing smoke alarms and smelling smoke, Blomenkamp said.
Unattended cooking caused the fire, which caused about $35,000 in damage, Blomenkamp said.
