Person seen fleeing before vacant house in Seattle’s Judkins Park goes up in flames

A house fire in the Seattle neighborhood of Judkins Park broke out Tuesday morning and a person can be seen fleeing the area in a neighbor’s security camera video.

The Seattle Fire Department (SFD) crews responded to the fire at the single-story home at 24th Avenue South & South Holgate Street, near the Coleman Playground, just after 8 a.m.

The home was reportedly vacant at the time of the fire, and by 8:30 a.m. fire crews entered the building to extinguish the fire and search the property. Crews found no one at the property.

The fire was fully extinguished before 9 a.m., according to the department’s post on X.

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KIRO Newsradio went to the scene of the fire and talked to some neighbors in the area, including Anny Ness, who said she saw smoke as she was walking her daughter to school.

“Luckily, they got here so quickly because there are so many surrounding multifamily homes right next to it, but the entire house was engulfed,” Ness said. “So, it’s lucky it didn’t jump to one of the other buildings, for sure.”

Ness also confirmed that the building was unoccupied but did say that she wouldn’t be surprised if squatters were staying in the building.

A neighbor who lives next to the building had video footage of the incident, in which a figure can be seen exiting the house before getting on a bike and riding away a second before the fire exploded out of the house’s windows. The neighbor provided video of the incident to KIRO Newsradio but wished to remain anonymous.

“I was concerned that my house is going to catch on fire or that the fire was going to spread,” the neighbor said. “The house that burned down had been vacant for a while, and some squatters had been living there. We called the developer several times to have them come to secure the house, but they haven’t done anything. So we’ve been worried about this, and it’s kind of like the thing you’re worried about finally happens, right?”

SFD is currently investigating the incident to determine a cause.

Contributing: Sam Campbell, KIRO Newsradio

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