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Woman dies in fire at apartment

The cause of the blaze is being investigated by state and local authorities.

By JONATHAN ABEL, Times Staff Writer
Published October 10, 2007


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photo
[Jim Damaske | Times]
A Pinellas County Sheriff's crime scene investigator documents the scene of a fatal apartment fire at 223 Dolphin Point.

CLEARWATER - A fire killed one woman Tuesday afternoon in an apartment complex at 223 Dolphin Point on Island Estates, according to fire officials.

Officials withheld the victim's name until her family could be informed.

The property manager found the victim with the help of other people in the complex and called 911 about 2:22 p.m., fire officials said.

The fire was in Unit 9 of the 10-unit, two-story complex and had already extinguished itself by the time firefighters arrived, reported public safety spokeswoman Elizabeth Daly-Watts.

The cause of the fire was under investigation by city police and fire, as well as by the state Fire Marshal's Office and an investigator from Palm Harbor Fire Rescue.

The building where the fire took place is in the shadow of Dolphin Cove condominium tower, where a fifth-floor fire June 28, 2002, killed two residents and injured three firefighters.

In the Dolphin Cove fire - the Clearwater fire department's most serious firefighting incident in decades, if not ever - firefighters took 28 minutes to hit the blaze with water. A St. Petersburg Times review later found that firefighters didn't follow fundamental, accepted rules of firefighting and violated their own guidelines.

Among other things, firefighters at Dolphin Cove connected their hoses to a standpipe down the hall from the fire, not to a standpipe in the stairwell below it, as is the accepted practice. The hallway pipe had no water because a ground-level valve was turned off.

That fire led the city to make changes in the department's organization, training and staffing. On Tuesday, Clearwater firefighters hooked up to a hydrant working properly, Daly-Watts said.

[Last modified October 9, 2007, 21:22:03]


Share your thoughts on this story

Comments on this article
by DAVID 10/10/07 10:54 PM
Thank you Kathy.
by Martha 10/10/07 08:47 PM
I totally agree with Kathy. To mention Dolphin Cove in this article is nothing short of YELLOW Journalism. It's sad that you use this poor woman's loss of life to promote your uninformed opinion.
by miss u kate 10/10/07 04:40 PM
kate was my best friend since we were just four. she was the most interesting human i have ever met. and she has the most fantastic family. words cannot describe how many people loved this girl.
by Kathy 10/10/07 01:19 PM
I think it is sad that the newspaper feels the need to be-little this young womens death with the past. I want to read how great Kati was instead of past problems in a building next door.
by briahan 10/10/07 12:45 PM
R.I.P god bless her heart <3 briahna
by Kevin 10/10/07 09:47 AM
Why is it that the St.Pete Times cannot ever print a story regarding CFD without mentioning the Dolphin Cove incident. How does this incident have anything to do with Dolphin cove other than it's physical locating?
by HJR 10/10/07 08:00 AM
The firefighters need competent chiefs that know what they are doing to lead them. They are hampered by the likes of what they have now. The chiefs tactics are not sound, just like some of the previous administration. The ones that knew were run off.
by HSR 10/10/07 07:57 AM
Nice yellow journalism by Jonathan Abel. The first fire at Dolphin Cove was nothing like this fire. Find something new to report on or move on.
by Hank 10/10/07 07:53 AM
The firefighters can only do what their chiefs tell them to do. The same tactics are being taught that killed another woman where they came from in Fairfax County. Read and hear it at http://cms.firehouse.com/content/article/printer.jsp?id=55486
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