Apartment fire just off City Avenue

A fire broke out Wednesday night at the Lincoln Green apartment complex in the 4000 block of Presidential Boulevard in the River Park neighborhood on the edge of Philadelphia.

Flames poured out of the three-story structure, near the intersection of City Avenue and the Schuylkill Expressway.

One occupant was rescued by firefighters and taken to a hospital for observation, Deputy Fire Chief Michael Wahl said.

The fire was reported to police at 8:41 p.m., he said. Firefighters found heavy fire in second- and third-floor apartments. The fire was declared under control at 9:34 p.m.

No firefighters were injured, though at one point they evacuated the building as a precaution, then continued fighting the blaze.

Beverly Brown, 47, was in her apartment, two units away from where the fire started, when "all of a sudden I hear banging on my door," she said.

She went to her balcony and saw flames shooting out from the middle of her building.

"I grabbed my pets. I grabbed my purse, and ran out the door," she said, referring to her 22-year-old tropical bird, TJ, and her six-foot-long iguana, Digga.

She and some other residents complained that they had not heard a fire alarm.

"If it wasn't for the neighbors banging on the door, I don't think I would've got out," she said.