Woman dies in house fire near Wasson High School

A rash of local house fires took a tragic turn on Tuesday as a woman died from a fire in her Wasson-area home - the second significant residential fire of the day in Colorado Springs, and the eighth in two weeks.

The woman, who had not been identified as of late Tuesday, was found by firefighters near the front door of her home at 2226 Lockhaven Dr. A neighbor called to report the fire at 1:45 p.m. and the Colorado Springs Fire Department arrived at 1:52 p.m.

The woman was not breathing when firefighters found her. They performed CPR and took her to Memorial Hospital, where she was in critical condition before being pronounced dead at 2:37 p.m. Colorado Springs Fire Department spokesman Lt. Jeff Sievers said the woman suffered burns and smoke inhalation.

According to county records, the home is owned by Ione Tudor, an elderly widow, but it was unknown if she was the victim.

The blaze badly damaged the main level of the house, Sievers said. Firefighters haven't determined the cause.

Fire department spokeswoman Lt. Julie Stone seemed rattled as she stood outside Tudor's home in this modest neighborhood of 1960s brick-faced ranchers and reflected on eight residential fires in the city since Dec. 24, including one Tuesday morning in southeast Colorado Springs which caused $60,000 in damage to a townhouse.

"It's been a weird 13 days," Stone said. "They're all starting to blur together."

House fires are more common in cold weather when people must heat their homes, and there's occasionally a spike around the holidays. Yet, this string of serious fires is unusual.

"This is extreme," said Jennifer Mariano, spokeswoman for the Pikes Peak Red Cross, which provides lodging, food, clothing and medicine to fire victims. "We are seeing the largest disaster increase in our history."

The Red Cross has helped twice as many fire victims and spent twice as much money in the past six months than it did in the same period the year before. The agency budgets $35,000 for local disaster relief each year, and halfway through its fiscal year it has spent $41,000.

"It's a scary situation," Mariano said. "I just don't know how many more fundraising ideas I can come up with. The disasters are coming faster than we can come up with new ideas."

Fire Marshall Brett Lacey said there doesn't appear to be a common thread between the fires, except for the type of mistakes people make - leaving a pot unattended on the stove, forgetting about a candle, allowing fire to escape the fireplace, putting flammable items too close to a furnace, or getting a grill too close to the house.

"Unattended cooking is probably the biggest," Lacey said. "If we could get Julia Child to come back and teach people appropriate ways of cooking, it would save a lot of alarms and a lot of fires."

Unattended cooking was the cause of the Tuesday morning fire at the townhouse at 4250 Charleston Drive, near Hancock Expressway and Jetwing Drive. A neighbor was treated for smoke inhalation.

Lacey thinks the best thing the fire department can do is educate people on the basics of fire prevention. But, he said, during the past three years those efforts have diminished as resources shrink.

"Strong prevention efforts do help lower the incidence of fires," Lacey said, "but as times get tougher for everybody, it will be tougher for us to maintain vigilance."

In fact, he expects things to get worse. He's not sure how the fire department can step up prevention programs or an inspection schedule that he feels is already insufficient. As the economy suffers, he thinks commercial fires also will increase as companies cut safety programs and cut corners to make ends meet.

-- Lance Benzel of The Gazette contributed to this report

FIRE LOG

Dec. 24: 516 Sunset Road; damages $35,000, accidental, cause combustible items too close to furnace
Dec. 26: 2700 Wheeler Avenue; damages $4,000, accidental, cause chimney related
Dec. 27: 5069 Nolte Drive North; damages $150,000, cause still under investigation
Dec. 28: 1407 McArthur Ave.; damages $135,000, accidental, cause unattended fireplace
Jan. 1: 7015 Blazing Trail Drive; $225,000, accidental, cause charcoal grill
Jan. 2: 1030 Norwood Avenue; damages $10,000, caused by unattended candle
Jan. 6: 4250 Charleston Drive, damages $60,000, caused by unattended cooking
Jan. 6: 2226 Lockhaven Drive., damages unknown, cause unknown