Two hurt in Wheeling apartment fire, other residents evacuated

A Wheeling man was airlifted to Loyola Medical Center in Maywood after he was severely burned in an apartment fire early today in Wheeling.

His wife was taken to Northwest Community Hospital in Arlington Heights with less severe injuries, said Wheeling Fire Chief Keith MacIsaac.

The fire department began receiving 911 calls at 3:30 a.m. about a blaze at 1659 Woodduck Drive in the sprawling Mallard Lake apartment complex, MacIsaac said.

Firefighters arrived to find two people lying in the front yard, the man with burns over 50 percent of his body and the woman suffering from smoke inhalation and severe cuts to her legs, the chief said. Both the first and second floor apartments were burning.

A relative who said he had been in the first-floor apartment told officials he was able to escape outside and then took a chair and smashed the master bedroom window to reach the other two. He pulled the woman through window, which is how she got the cuts.

The upstairs unit also was gutted, but no residents were home at the time, MacIsaac said.

Officials weren't releasing the names and ages of the victims.

Residents in the other six apartments in the building are being relocated because the building is without electricity and water.

While the cause of the fire is under investigation, MacIsaac said it started in the first-floor living room, and appears to be accidental. There was a smoke detector, but officials don't know if it was working.

The building is old enough that it didn't have sprinklers. Fire damage was put at $500,000.

Twelve other fire departments assisted Wheeling; no firefighters were injured.

The eight-unit buildings on each side of the vacated one had to be evacuated for several hours.

A resident of one of those buildings, Devesh Rana, said he woke up to lights, sirens and pounding on the door.

Rana, his wife and their two children grabbed passports, cell phone, keys and wallet and fled outside. Flames were shooting out of the first floor of the adjoining building.

"We were crossing our fingers the whole time that the fire would not spread to our building because its right next door," said Rana, who works as a software programmer for HSBC Bank in Vernon Hills.

"That was our first thought, and our second thought was what happened to the people in there."

Firefighters left the still smoky scene shortly after noon.