UPDATE: Fire Damages SE OKC Apartment Complex

A fire destroys a laundry facility and apartment at a southeast Oklahoma City complex. The fire started at about 3:30 p.m. Sunday afternoon at the Madison Village Apartments near S.E. 53rd St. and Sunnyvale Ave. The fire department suspects arson.

"Some witnesses saw some children running from the scene," Oklahoma City Fire Maj. Robert Mitchell said.

Neighbors said children were playing with magazines and lighters at the complex's laundromat.

"The parents are not watching their kids. Instead of watching there kids, they're in here doing God whatsoever in the house, while the kids is out here running around here," resident Samuel Jackson said.

The building that caught fire houses the laundromat, two apartment units, leasing office and pool house, firefighters said.  Only one apartment was occupied.  The chemicals for the pool could have made it a dangerous situation. Major Mitchell said concern with the chemicals had firefighters treating the fire defensively when they first arrived.

"If the kids had gotten inside there and gotten into those chemicals it could have been bad for them," Maj. Mitchell said.

A neighbor said the couple who lived there is coping with the loss.

"I talked with them and they're very emotional at this point, and everybody else is very emotional at this point," Altune Ulmer said. "All they got out of their apartment was only their clothes and that's the only thing they really saved out of their apartment."

Firefighters said the couple was moved into another unit at Madison Village.

Everyone got out safely.  The fire department said one firefighter injured his wrist on the job.

Posted: Monday, February 18 2013, 09:39 PM CST