Lakewood fire kills 2 and leaves remaining residents with nothing

LAKEWOOD, WASH. — Two are killed after a fire ripped through a Lakewood mobile home park.

The blaze started in a neighboring field and spread to the Jamestown Mobile Home Park homes around 3:30 pm Friday.

Nine of those homes were completely destroyed, and some have only a foundation left. Five additional homes were damaged. Saturday, residents picked through the debris in hopes of finding anything to salvage.

“It’s devastating,” said Michael Martin whose house is now completely gone, burned in the fire. “This trailer actually got us out of homelessness. we were living in our car for a while,” he added.

Michael Martin said the place he’s called home for the last five years has seen a few brush fires spark up in the field behind him.

“It’s never any major damage. we just get out and we’re right back in less than an hour but for some reason, it just didn’t happen like that,” Michael explained.

“We get everybody, and they get their hoses and it usually works but it didn’t this time. it was too intense. too hot and too quick,” said Judy Morgan, who also lives in the park.

Residents said they could only watch in horror as the flames inched toward their doorsteps.

“By the time I knew it was pretty much burning the blackberry bushes directly behind our bedroom wall,” Michael said he ran in the home multiple times to get pets, find important papers, and anything he could.

“I came back in a 3rd time and it was just a wall of black smoke. there was fire getting to the exterior getting closer and closer to my front door. Judy added, “it was terrible. it was like you couldn’t do anything. All you could do is yell.”

Two men in the same home would tragically not make it out in time and died in the fire. Their names haven’t been released. Judy’s son lost everything as well. His was one of the nine destroyed.

“That was all the life that he built from working. he’s lost everything. plus he had some of his dad’s stuff- he passed away,” she said.

The people watching the fire burn said it felt like 20 minutes before West Pierce Fire arrived. The department said their records show the first crew got there 5 minutes after the initial dispatch, but that’s all it took for the fire to reduce one corner of the park to ashes.

“We lost everything but the clothes on our backs and a backpack. We’re just going to have to take it day by day and rely on our friends and family for right now,” said Michael.

West Pierce Fire is still looking into how the brush fire started. There are a few GoFundMe’s created to help the people here rebuild.

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