3-alarm Fire Destroys Webster, Mass. Home

(NECN: Kathryn Sotnik, Webster, Mass.) - Two people were forced to jump from a second floor window following an intense house fire in Webster, Mass.

Flames broke out around 4 a.m. at the multi-family home located at 4 Goddard Street.

Thirty-three-year-old Asa Hunter says he was sleeping on the first floor when he heard the smoke detectors go off, saw flames pouring from the back porch, and ran to alert everyone else in the house.

Hunter yelled up to the two men on the second floor to "get out," but they became trapped from the heavy flames and thick smoke.

Forty-nine-year-old John Noga tells us he was one of the men trapped. He helped his friend, George, out of the window first and then jumped himself.

"I wouldn't have gotten out any other way, if I didn't jump I wouldn't have made it," says Noga, "I lost everything."

Hunter says, "they were looking for a ladder or something but there was nothing around, so I was like you have to jump and they ended up jumping."

Fire Chief Brian Hickey tells us the tenants were woken up by smoke detectors and that one tenant came out to find a couch on the back porch burning.

The State Fire Marshal's office is on scene to determine the cause. A Webster police detective, according to the chief, was also at a local hospital interviewing several people.

By 8:30 am firefighters were still on the scene, taming hot spots.

The chief says the building will have to be knocked down. Part of it actually collapsed in the fire. Two other houses nearby even had their siding melted off because the heat from the flames was so intense.

Five people were in the house at the time of the fire. One of the men who jumped from the second floor window was brought to a local hospital and then transferred to another hospital in Worcester to be treated for what tenants believe may be a broken hip or leg.

No fire fighters were injured. Sadly a cat did die in the fire according to residents.

Red Cross is at the scene to help the people displaced.

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