{"id":464120,"date":"2026-10-12T22:18:10","date_gmt":"2026-10-12T22:18:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/464120\/"},"modified":"2026-10-12T22:18:10","modified_gmt":"2026-10-12T22:18:10","slug":"i-didnt-know-if-anybody-was-trapped-tenants-spring-into-action-during-southwest-side-apartment-fire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/464120\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I didn\u2019t know if anybody was trapped\u2019: Tenants spring into action during Southwest Side apartment fire"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN ANTONIO \u2013 As flames swallowed up<\/a> a second-floor apartment Monday morning, Ronald Garcia felt a lump rising in his throat.<\/p>\n

He wondered whether he might be watching someone also being consumed by that same fire. <\/p>\n

\u201cI started worrying because I didn\u2019t know if anybody was trapped in there,\u201d Garcia said. \u201cI know it\u2019s not the smartest idea to kick in a door when there\u2019s flames because of the oxygen, but we were a little worried.\u201d<\/p>\n

He, along with his coworkers and tenants at the Park Vista apartments, sprang into action, banging on doors of the building to alert people and doing what they could to get to anyone inside those units.<\/p>\n

The fire broke out around 9:30 a.m. at the complex, located off Military Drive West and Five Palms Drive.<\/p>\n

Garcia also grabbed his phone and captured video of the flames, pushing through a window. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe window was already busted out of both sides and the door was locked,\u201d Garcia said. \u201cThank God it was empty.\u201d<\/p>\n

Juan Aragon, who lives on the ground floor of the building, said he was alerted to the fire by someone who came to his door. <\/p>\n

\u201cI just heard a banging,\u201d Aragon said. \u201cI wondered who was banging, so I just went to the door. He said, \u2018The building\u2019s on fire.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Aragon said he quickly called out to his granddaughter, who was working from home.<\/p>\n

The two then grabbed some of their personal property and ran from the apartment.<\/p>\n

Several hours later, they were still waiting for the all clear to return home.<\/p>\n

The fire damaged one or two apartments beyond the unit where it started, according to the fire department.<\/p>\n

Aragon\u2019s apartment was spared.<\/p>\n

He said what happened, with people helping during the fire, has given him an encouraging perspective on his neighbors.<\/p>\n

\u201cI see a lot of people now moving to help each other, you know?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The cause of the fire is still under investigation. <\/p>\n

Read also:<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 by KSAT – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN ANTONIO \u2013 As flames swallowed up a second-floor apartment Monday morning, Ronald Garcia felt a lump rising…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":464121,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[630,633,82,84,83,15378],"class_list":["post-464120","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-fire","tag-safd","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news","tag-southwest-side"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464120","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=464120"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464120\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/464121"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=464120"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=464120"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=464120"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}