STOCKTON, Calif. — A two-alarm grass fire has left one family displaced after burning inches away from an apartment complex and a neighborhood of homes on Farmington Road, officials with the Stockton Fire Department said.
Around 12:10 p.m. Friday, Stockton Firefighters say they were called to the area of Farmington Road and Mission Valley Lane in Stockton after reports came in of a grass fire.
Once a captain arrived on the scene, he says he noticed the fire spreading from an open grass lot toward fences, homes, and an apartment complex and called in a second alarm.
Twenty-nine firefighters from across the city began rushing to the scene as the flames came inches away from the Farmington North Apartments.
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Victor Martinez, who was inside his apartment when the fire started, says he walked outside Friday afternoon to see a plume of smoke billowing from the side of his apartment complex.
"One of our neighbors told us that everything was crackling and the fire was really dark," Martinez said. "I came out and we couldn't see because the fire was everywhere on the side so we initially thought it was the apartments."
Upon seeing the dark, blanketing smoke and flames, Martinez and dozens of other residents hastily began evacuating their apartments in fear that their units could catch fire.
"We didn't know what to do so we just got everything, all of our stuff packed our bags ,and left," Martinez said. "You don't expect this on a summer day. You expect people to be out in the water, playing around, having fun."
For Vanny Xayaosa, whose house neighbors the grass lot, seeing the flames at the edge of her backyard gave her just enough time to evacuate her home.
"It scared me," said Xayaosa "I just took my baby and evacuated from the house."
Firefighters say that while no structures burned, one apartment unit was damaged displacing a family. A cause for the fire is still under investigation.
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