Firefighters Brave 95-Degree Heat Fighting Apartment Blaze

A Thursday afternoon fire sent residents jumping from the second floor.

The fire occurred at a two-story building in the 100 block of Durham Road in Penndel Borough around 12:30 p.m.

A passerby spotted flames coming from the side of the building, which houses a doors business on the first floor and two apartments on the second.

The passerby alerted the residents of the fire and they jumped to the ground below, said Jim Bampfield, a Middletown Township firefighter and Penndel Borough’s fire marshal.

“The passerby saved them definitely,” he said.

Flames were heavy around the deck on the second floor

An image taken shortly after the blaze was first reported showed heavy fire coming from the structure.

Penndel Borough police and firefighters quickly arrived to the scene.

The fire was placed under control in under an hour, said Frank Farry, the chief of the Langhorne-Middletown Fire Company, who was command on the scene.

The damage was largely contained to the second floor and roof of the building, fire officials stated.

Bampfield said one resident suffered a burn to their leg, but they refused treatment.

A cat that was in one of the apartments was later found deceased inside, Farry said.

The cause of the fire remained under investigation as of late afternoon.

One firefighter was taken from the scene to the hospital for heat exhaustion.

Due to the 95-degree heat, the Penndel-Middletown Emergency Squad set up a fan for firefighters and handed out cold bottles of water.

Farry said there were multiple 9-1-1 calls about the fire.

The Middletown Township Department of Fire and Emergency Management and the Fairless Hills, Levittown No. 2, Langhorne-Middletown, Newport, Newtown, Penndel, Third District, and William Penn fire companies responded to the scene.

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