Two People Hospitalized After Apartment Fire in Gaithersburg

Two people were hospitalized and three others were displaced early Wednesday morning after a fire started in the Washingtonian Towers in Gaithersburg.

The fire was caused by power strips that were plugged into each other as well as into a lightweight extension cord, according to Chief spokesperson for Montgomery County Fire and Rescue Service Pete Piringer.

Residents discovered the fire themselves, and “the adult son assisted his mother to safety and then unsuccessfully attempted to extinguish the fire himself,” tweeted Piringer. The highrise does not have a sprinkler system.

The fire caused $30,000 in damage.

A ‘CLOSED DOOR’ was potentially a life saver & minimize even more damage at Washingtonian Towers, an unsprinklered high rise @MontgomeryCoMD residential building early (6/3) this morning. An accidental ‘electrical’ fire originated in bedroom (heavily damaged), 2 residents injured https://t.co/WLKG2I1ah1 pic.twitter.com/d9YXjtRz3R

— Pete Piringer (@mcfrsPIO) June 3, 2020

About Isabel Cleary

Isabel Cleary was a rising senior at the University of Maryland, majoring in Broadcast Journalism and International Relations. She was a summer 2020 intern at Montgomery Community Media. Follow her on twitter @IsabelCleary

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