Swissvale fire leaves rubble at 11-unit apartment building

March 03--A large, yellow backhoe dug into a pile of rubble Wednesday where a Swissvale apartment building stood a day earlier.

It clamped down onto splintered wood, crumbled bricks and what appeared to be the contents of a family's closet, lifting it into the bed of a waiting truck. A teddy bear stuck out from a corner of the machine's jaw.

"To think that less than 24 hours ago, I was worried about landscaping and leaky faucets," said Mark Haak of Fox Chapel, owner of the 11-unit apartment building at the corner of Woodstock Avenue and Melrose Street that a fire destroyed Tuesday night.

No one was injured in the four-alarm fire that remains under investigation. The American Red Cross provided assistance to 25 adults and 24 children living in the apartment building and two other nearby properties affected by the fire, agency spokesman Kevin Brown said.

Residents were housed in several hotels, he said.

"We will work with our community partners to help these folks over the next few days and into the future," Brown said.

Haak said he received a call about a fire in the building about 7 p.m. and arrived at the scene about a half hour later.

He said he was shocked by what he found.

"I thought it was a small kitchen fire or something," Haak said.

Instead, high winds whipped flames high above the three-story structure and kept firefighters busy past midnight. Swissvale officials decided to raze the building overnight because of safety concerns.

Crews worked Wednesday to clear the debris left by the toppled building.

Bricks and wooden cabinets mixed with plaster-coated lath, crushed washing machines and refrigerators, wet mattresses and sections of twisted iron railing.

A red Adidas sneaker sat atop a pile. Purple-and-white streamers attached to a girl's pink bicycle fluttered nearby. Sheets and a zebra-print fleece blanket spilled out of a red storage tub.

Haak, who owns about 350 units around the Pittsburgh area, said he plans to meet Thursday with insurance agents. He said he does not plan to rebuild, given the cost of new construction and the low-cost rental market in Swissvale.

"It's hard for me to look at it now," said Haak, an attorney who bought the property in 1995. "I put a lot of money into upgrading this building."

Haak said he recently had the hallways painted and added a furnace.

He praised firefighters for their efforts.

"They made sure everyone got out and contained the fire. It could have gone down the whole row," he said, noting how closely neighboring houses stand along Woodstock Avenue.

Jason Cato is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach him at 412-320-7936 or [email protected].

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