3 Killed In Apartment Blaze

BALTIMORE (AP) _ An intense fire torched an apartment building early Saturday, killing three people and forcing 11 families to scramble for safety, a fire official said. <br/><br/>The blaze, reported at

Saturday, July 14th 2007, 4:40 pm

By: News On 6

BALTIMORE (AP) _ An intense fire torched an apartment building early Saturday, killing three people and forcing 11 families to scramble for safety, a fire official said.

The blaze, reported at about 3 a.m., burned three apartments on top of one another in a three-story building in northwest Baltimore, said Fire Department spokesman Chief Kevin Cartwright. Most residents escaped on their own.

Firefighters found those killed in a basement apartment, Cartwright said. Authorities were not immediately able to determine their identities, genders or ages, he said.

``They apparently did suffer smoke inhalation and burns, so they're not identifiable,'' Cartwright said.

Investigators were seeking the cause. It comes less than two months after a row house fire in the city killed eight people, five of them children.

Elsewhere, fire in a house at Henderson, N.C., killed a woman and her fraternal twins early Saturday. The victims had tried to escape and were found in the kitchen, victims of smoke inhalation, said firefighters in the city about 40 miles north of Raleigh.

The fire may have been caused by a malfunction in a window air conditioning unit, officials said. It was being investigated, fire officials said.

Relatives identified the victims as Stacy Moore, 34, a single mother, and her 12-year-old son and daughter, Kadarius Moore and Kadijah Moore.