Careless smoking is being blamed for weekend fires that killed two 95-year-olds on Chicago’s South Side and in suburban Mt. Prospect. Both residences lacked working smoking detectors, fire officials said.
The Chicago fire broke out about 9:30 a.m. Sunday in a two-story brick building in the 6300 block of South Rhodes Avenue, Officer Marcel Bright said.
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Denazaid Richard, 95, who lived on the first floor, was taken to University of Chicago Hospitals in serious condition, and she was pronounced dead there about 11:30 p.m. Sunday, a Cook County medical examiner’s office spokesman said.
A neighbor had pulled Richard out of the burning home, and firefighters helped a 61-year-old woman out, Chicago Fire Department spokeswoman Eve Rodriguez said.
The 61-year-old was in serious condition Monday in the U. of C. Hospitals, Bright said.
Investigators from the Police Department’s bomb and arson unit determined the fire was caused by cigarettes on the second floor, police said. Neither floor had working smoke detectors, Rodriguez said.
In Mt. Prospect, firefighters responded at about 5:20 a.m. Sunday to a house fire in the 500 block of North Prospect Manor Avenue and found heavy smoke had engulfed the building, according to a statement from the Mt. Prospect Fire Department.
Firefighters searched the single-story home and found a body on the floor of the family room, Deputy Chief John Malcolm said. A 3-foot-wide section of the floor in that room was burned through to the basement, he said. The blaze caused about $250,000 in damage.
The victim, Joseph Vavra, 95, was pronounced dead about 5:45 a.m. at Northwest Community Hospital in Arlington Heights, said a spokeswoman for the medical examiner’s office. No one else was in the house, and it appeared that Vavra lived alone, officials said.
On Monday, fire officials said the investigation determined there were no working smoke detectors.
“We believe what actually caused the fire was smoking materials,” Malcolm said.
Malcolm said investigators do not know the exact cause.
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