Fire Victims Trying to Pick Up the Pieces : Aftermath: Blaze causes separation of four old friends. Apartment managers seek to organize program for donations to aid burned-out residents.

Ann Roquemore stood Wednesday afternoon, shaking her head at the blackened shell of apartments on Ponderosa Street.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” said the 70-year-old woman who, like about 150 other people, saw her Park Villa apartment burn Tuesday afternoon. The heavy odor of ashes hung over the site, and charred debris littered the outside of the two-story apartments.

Roquemore said the most devastating part of the fire is the forced separation of four close friends who were longtime residents of the complex.

The other women--Beryl Fox, Janet Stewart and Hope Hanshaw--stayed with friends or relatives and may wind up scattered around the county when they eventually find new places to live.

“It was nice having them around,” Roquemore said. The four went to lunch regularly and checked in on each other occasionally, she said.

“I would like to move in with them. . . . But I don’t know where they are,” she said.

No one was injured in the blaze, which was apparently ignited accidentally by a welder’s torch and caused an estimated $3 million in damage to the 25-year-old complex.

The apartment managers were busy fielding calls and trying to organize a donation program for the residents.

“We’re still trying to regroup,” said Wendy Kibbe, an assistant manager. “Some people have come by, but we still don’t know who all has stuff left” in their apartments.

Officials with the Orange County chapter of the American Red Cross worked all day to help find housing and provide counseling for adults and children displaced by the fire.

“It’s a very traumatic time they’re going through,” said Connie Kronen, who heads the Red Cross disaster mental health unit. “What we do is emotional first aid, it’s an emotional Band-Aid.”

More than 80 adults and children came to the relief center on Golden Circle Drive for help and more are expected in the next few days.

Investigators were checking records to make sure the apartments met building codes in the city, said Larry Garcia, a spokesman for the Santa Ana Fire Department. Based on their preliminary inquiry, everything seems to have been maintained, Garcia said.

Firefighters, who battled the blaze for several hours Tuesday, said their task was made difficult because of the apartment’s wood-shake roof.

“When you have a wood-shake shingle roof . . . if it’s a pretty good size roof like yesterday . . . it doesn’t take much to get the roof going,” Garcia said.

Santa Ana, along with some other Orange County cities, has an ordinance prohibiting wood-shake roofs on new homes, Garcia said. “I was surprised for that many buildings that were involved there was no one injured and no one dead. That was a blessing almost,” he said.

A special fund has been set up to help the victims of the fire. Donations can be sent to the Orange County Chapter of the American Red Cross, Disaster Relief Fund, P.O. Box 11364, Santa Ana, Calif. 92711-1364.