Police Officers and Residents Escape Fire in Wallace Street Apartment

At least four people, including two police officers, escaped injury after being trapped in an apartment fire Tuesday night in Red Bank.

Red Bank Volunteer Fire Department Chief John Mego said borough police officers responded to reports of a fire in apartment 205 at 23 Wallace Street, just off of Broad Street, before 7 p.m. after an emergency call. While trying to assist the residents inside the second-floor unit, the unidentified officers and the residents became trapped as smoke and heat began to overwhelm them.

Firefighting crews from multiple borough deparments responded, and in minutes the four who were trapped inside were rescue by exiting a second-floor window and climbing down a fire department ladder.

The cause of the fire remains unknown. Mego said despite being trapped, none of the four people trapped inside suffered any injuries in the fire.

Water damage to the building as it was being sprayed also caused a partial collapse in the roof, Mego said.

In all, firefighters from four Red Bank companies, as well as a department from Little Silver and Fair Haven, responded to the two-alarm fire, which was knocked down shortly before 7:30 p.m.

Crews remain on the scene tending to cleanup.

An investigation is ongoing.