A fire at a Lawndale apartment building forced several people, including children, to jump from the third floor window early Friday in a dramatic escape caught on video.
The fire took place at around 4 a.m. at the three-story building in the 1200 block of South Central Park Avenue on Chicago's West Side, officials said.
There was heavy fire in the rear of the structure on the second floor that then traveled up the back porches to the third floor, the Chicago Fire Department's 14th Battalion Chief Don Hroma said at the scene.
Firefighters rescued six children on the third floor and two on the second floor who had no way to exit the fully-occupied building because of the heavy flames, authorities said. Firefighters used ladders up to the balcony below the window from which the residents had jumped.
"There were people hanging out of that third floor window on the front side of the building and a couple people started to hang jump out," Hroma said. "Smoke started to pump out of that window so they were probably starting to feel some heat from the fire below them and in the rear of the building."
A total of eight adults and 10 children were in the building at the time, officials said. All were accounted for and evacuated to a warming truck on the scene, authorities said. No injuries were reported.
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The fire was escalated to a still-and-box for more resources, according to Hroma, who said it was brought under control by around 5 a.m., with firefighters staying on the scene to finish extinguishing the flames.
The cause of the fire remained under investigation.
