14 people displaced by 3-alarm fire at Costa Mesa apartment complex Tuesday

Fourteen Costa Mesa apartment residents were displaced Tuesday by an early morning residential fire that broke out in a downstairs unit and destroyed two apartments before the blaze was extinguished, fire officials reported.

Costa Mesa Fire & Rescue Battalion Chief Chris Coates said the call came in shortly after 1 a.m., regarding the Mediterranean Village Apartments complex, at the corner of Harbor Boulevard and Fair Drive.

“The fire started on the bottom floor and extended into the second-floor unit,” Coates said Tuesday afternoon. “Two units were destroyed, and [two] other units were damaged. Fourteen people were displaced, and Red Cross arrived to offer assistance.”

Firefighters from Costa Mesa, Newport Beach, Fountain Valley, Huntington Beach and the Orange County Fire Authority responded Tuesday to a three-alarm fire in Costa Mesa.

(Courtesy of Costa Mesa Fire & Rescue)

Coates said the occupants of the apartment in which the fire began had left the unit for just a few minutes and came back to discover a blaze had broken out.

“The occupants who were upstairs were alerted by the smoke alarm in the original (downstairs) unit,” he added. “It woke them up, and they heard glass breaking and smelled smoke.”

Multiple agencies responded to the three-alarm fire, including units from Newport Beach, Fountain Valley, Huntington Beach and the Orange County Fire Authority, and extinguished the flames in approximately 47 minutes, Coates reported.

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