Seattle Fire Chief Gregory Dean, Mayor Mike McGinn and other city representatives met with members of the community July 1 to explain what happened during the apartment fire June 12 in Fremont that took five lives, offer their condolences and answer any questions residents might have.

The fire at 334 N.W. 41st St. started shortly after 10 a.m. when a foam mattress that had been leaning against a lightbulb in a first-floor closet ignited, Dean said.

He said someone in the apartment told Helen Gebregiorgis they smelled smoke. She tried to clear the smoke by opening windows downstairs and upstairs.

While Gebregiorgis was upstairs, she heard an explosion, which could have been an aerosol can or the windows, Dean said.

He said the open upstairs windows combined with a north wind to create a chimney effect, which brought flames and smoke rapidly to the second floor.

"If you've never been in a fire, what you don't appreciate is how fast it can go," Dean said. "Within a two-minute period, it can get to 2,000 degrees."

When firefighters arrived, there was heavy black smoke and flames coming from the first and second floors, he said.

Residents expressed their concern that the first fire engine on the scene drove past the fire. They said it appeared firefighters had trouble finding the address.

Dean said it is Seattle Fire Department procedure for the first unit on the scene to drive past the building in order to see three sides of it and gain more information. Engine 18 also drove past the site to make room for the ladder crew and medic van, he said.

Residents were also concerned by the amount of time it took for the water to be put on the fire after the arrival of the first engine.

Engine 18 suffered a mechanical problem, eventually deemed a worn transmission pad, which prevented it from pumping water, Dean said.

"Because Engine 18 was unable to get a line, there was a delay," he said. "Because it was unable to get water, there was a delay."

Despite Engine 18's water pump being tested that morning, crews had to wait for Engine 8 to arrive on the scene in order to get water on the fire, Dean said.

He said crews could not take water directly from the fire hydrant because hydrants do not provide enough pressure. Water needs to be directed through the engine in order to be pressurized.

During the water delay, approximately three or four minutes, crews were doing other things to attempt a rescue, such as looking at pressurize the neighboring unit and looking through the rear windows of the apartment for its residents, Dean said.

The fire took the lives of Eyerusalem Gebregiorgis, 22; Joseph Gebregiorgis, 13; Nyella Smith, 7; Yaseen Shamam, 5; and Nisreen Shamam, 6.

Dean said the fire impacted the family who lost loved ones as well as the community and the firefighters.

McGinn, who met with firefighters shortly after the fire, said the loss lays as heavily on the firefighters as it does with the community.

Catastrophic fires such as this create opportunities to improve safety, Dean said.

The apartment building was built prior to 1988 and not required to have a sprinkler system, he said. The Fire Department is looking at retroactively requiring sprinkler systems for buildings that include more than three units.

"We're hoping that we're going to be able to save lives from this," he said. That's our goal tonight."

Dean said the takeaway from the fire in Fremont is that fire prevention is even more important than before. It takes away all the unknowns that can occur during a fire he said.

Lisa Van Horn, Seattle Fire Department education director, said what needs to come out of this fire is that everyone needs to look at what they can do to improve the safety of their family and community.

Fires are most likely to start in residences and children are the most likely victims of those fires, Van Horn said. She said there are two ways households can improve their safety immediately.

The first is to make a plan. Include every family member, from babies to grandparents, in that plan and find at least two ways out of the residence. Pick a an outside place to meet after a fire and practice the plan at least twice a year.

The second way to improve safety is to make sure there is at least one smoke alarm on every floor of the residence and preferably one per bedroom. Residents need to know how to test the alarms and replace them if they are more than 10 years old.