Victim’s Cigarette Believed Cause of Fatal Fire in His Hotel Room

Smoking in bed was apparently the cause of a fire that cost a guest at the downtown Maryland Hotel his life, the Fire Department said Sunday.

The victim in the Saturday night fire was a 31-year-old man who checked into the hotel Thanksgiving Day. His name has not been released.

A 70-year-old hotel resident collapsed while being evacuated and was taken to Mercy Hospital where she was treated and released, fire officials said.

About ten people were displaced from the hotel and spent the night at a nearby shelter, fire officials said.

The fire at the hotel at Sixth Avenue and F Street started about 8:35 p.m. and was confined to one room on the sixth floor of the retirement hotel which is still home to a large number of elderly residents.

It was the fourth major fire in the last two years at the hotel, which does not have a sprinkler system, fire officials said.

Each room is equipped with a smoke detector, and fire officials are investigating whether the alarm in the room where the fire began was in working condition.