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Late Saturday night, fire ripped through a quadraplex that's situated off 65th Avenue between Wedgewood Street and Two Notch Road in Myrtle Beach. The fire left six people without homes.
Myrtle Beach Fire Rescue responded around 10:45 p.m. Saturday, and by that time most of the building was on fire. Three of the units were occupied at the time, and everyone made it out without injury.
Donald Jewell and his wife lived in one of the units that sustained the most damage. Only a skeleton of their unit remained standing.
"My whole life went up in smoke," Jewell said.
He had lived there for almost 15 years, and everything he had was in that house.
"Thought I was set for quite a few years, but now it's just gone. Can't even change clothes," he said as he watched investigators sift through the burnt debris.
The Jewell's poodle of eight or nine years wasn't able to escape the flames, but that didn't stop Donald from trying to rescue him.
"Smoke was just burning me up. Ran back out to try to find something to cover my face with and run back in for him. By then it was just up in flames."
Myrtle Beach Fire Rescue spokesman Sam Vest said fire investigators from Horry County Fire Rescue, as well as Myrtle Beach investigators, have been called in to help with the investigation.
As of Sunday afternoon, Vest said investigators determined the room where the fire started, but how it started remains under investigation.
