SAN ANTONIO – San Antonio firefighters spent their morning breaking through pieces of a smoking apartment complex roof, as others rescued helpless pets inside the burning building. The two story complex is located in the 4600 block of Dietrich Road off of North W.W. White Road on the East side.
"When we got there we had smoke showing from the two right apartments," said San Antonio Fire Department Captain Jeremy Huntsman.
Huntsman said a woman who escaped one of those apartments begged firefighters to rescue her two cats inside.
"On the bottom floor the occupant said there were two cats so the boys went in there and found both cats. They're doing well," Huntsman said.
They're lucky to be safe, considering the electrical fire started in that apartment.
"It looked like it started on the bottom floor then worked its way to the top floor and got behind the mansard roof," Huntsman explained.
He says a mansard roof, the kind that slopes down and forms steep angled edges, makes fires tough to put out.
"The mansard roof that goes around the outside of the edge of that building made it pretty difficult to find that fire. It sneaks in there and kind of walks around the entire building," he said.
A close call during that battle proving how dangerous the job really was.
"We had one firefighter fall through a hole but he didn't go all the way through. his crew got him out pretty quick," Huntsman said.
That firefighter was okay and did not need medical attention.
Even though Huntsman estimates there's more than $100,000 worth of damage, and both apartments are a total loss, he said everyone involved is lucky to be alright.