On April 18, the Bell apartments–a two-story apartment building near the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse campus–caught fire. Around 1:30 p.m., firefighters from La Crosse and Shelby responded to reports of the right side of the building entirely immersed in flames.
While the cause of the fire remains under investigation, only one minor injury was reported. When responders got to the scene, they found two students rescuing a tenant through a first-story window.
Kaiden Brenneman-Sorenson, a sophomore at a local university, told WXOW, “Me and my friend just instinctively ran towards the window to save him,” Brenneman-Sorenson said. “We had to bust open the screen door and get him out of the window that way.”
University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire student Charles Mroz was with Sorenson when the two noticed a wave of smoke coming from Zeigler Street. The men moved closer to the scene, where what began as curiosity transitioned into a rescue mission.
“That’s when we kind of realized, oh my gosh, it’s an actual fire,” Mroz told Channel 3000.
The men began knocking on doors and attempting to set off fire alarms to alert those still inside the building. It was then that they encountered a resident who couldn’t escape through their apartment door, as smoke began to seep through and the handle was hot to the touch.
“That was when me and [Mroz] knew we had to bust open the screen and pull him out,” Brenneman-Sorenson said.
The students broke the window screen, and with help from additional bystanders, they successfully pulled the tenant out of the building.
“I was kind of just in shock about everything that happened,” said Mroz. “But also proud of myself, too. Proud of everybody else that stepped up too.”
Firefighters were able to put out the flames about 20 minutes after arriving at the scene.
“The whole end that you see behind me was on fire and as I pulled up, as the first rigs pulled up, there were actually some students rescuing a resident out of the first floor,” said Lance Tryggestad, La Crosse Fire Department battalion chief. “No terrible injuries, but they were able to thankfully pull up and save him.”
For temporary shelter, an MTU bus was provided for those displaced by the fire. Police officers at the scene directed any students from the UWL who reside at the Bell apartments to the UWL Student Union for additional support.
