A pair of late-night residential fires broke out Thursday near West Penn Hospital in Pittsburgh, displacing at least 20 tenants and sending three people to the hospital.
The injured — two city police officers and one resident — were being treated for smoke inhalation.
There were no other injuries from the twin blazes in the city’s Bloomfield neighborhood.
Pittsburgh fire Battalion Chief John Gardell could not say whether the fires were connected.
They are under investigation.
The first fire broke out around 10:20 p.m. in a multi-unit residence in the 4700 block of Friendship Avenue, across Mathilda Street and two buildings down from West Penn.
The second, in a first-floor apartment in the 4900 block of Friendship Avenue at Millvale Avenue, across Friendship Park from the hospital, erupted as firefighters battled the first blaze in the bone-chilling cold.
Firefighters had knocked down both fires by 12:15 a.m. Friday.
Kiteri Kamacho, a ground-floor resident in the building where the second blaze occurred, said she and her husband were in bed when firefighters knocked and awakened them, telling them to leave.
Kamacho left with her cat in her arms while her husband led the couple’s dog out on a leash.
Gardell said city police made one arrest at the scene of the second fire but he released no other details.
It was not clear whether the arrest was related to the fires.
Police on scene declined comment.
Gardell said the apartment where the fire broke out in the 4900 block sustained damage as did the unit above, while parts of the rest of the building had smoke damage.