A fire left four apartments uninhabitable Thursday night but did not seriously injure anyone.
Gainesville Fire Rescue investigators still do not know the cause of the fire at the Bivens Cove Apartments complex, located at 3301 SW 13th St., though they suspect it may have been candles and have ruled out an electrical cause.
By the time firefighters arrived, flames were poking through the roof of a two-story building in the complex, said GFR Deputy Fire Chief Tim Hayes.
It took firefighters about 30 minutes to extinguish the fire, said GFR District 1 Fire Chief Richard Saulsberry.
No injuries were reported, but one person had to be taken to the hospital for smoke inhalation, Hayes said.
The man was later identified by his wife as Brian Shadwill, 23, who suffers from asthma. Shadwill, who was in an adjacent apartment at the time the fire broke out, was taken to Shands at UF for treatment of smoke inhalation, his wife said.
Joong Hyuk Mian, one of the residents who had to be evacuated, held his 2-year-old son and stood next to his wife, Moon Jung Jang, as firefighters finished extinguishing the flames.
Mian, who lived in the apartment adjacent to the one where the fire began, said he found out about the fire when a neighbor knocked on his door and told him to leave immediately.
The American Red Cross offered to help residents whose apartments were declared uninhabitable.
The damaged apartments were still closed off with yellow caution tape Sunday. It is not yet known when residents of the most damaged units will be able to move back into their apartments.
Alton Herbest, a Fort White resident, was driving in to the complex to visit a friend when he saw the flames.
Herbest said when he found out there were three animals in Shadwill's apartment, he went inside the unit and grabbed Shadwill's dog, Bebop Jr. He went back to search for two missing cats, who were later found.
"I am just glad no one is hurt," Herbest said. "That's all I care about."
