January 20, 2011
By: Carrie Van Brunt
A nine-year-old girl has died of injuries suffered in a house fire in Prince George's County, Maryland, Tuesday night, and three others have suffered traumas of varying severity.
The fire, which investigators say began on the home's first floor, spread quickly. Neighbor Don Watson was the first to call 911, according to NBC Washington.
"By the time I got off the phone, the whole house was covered in flames," Watson told the television news station.
Two of the four daughters in the house were injured, and nine-year-old Kimberly Hernandez and her 13-year-old sister - one of a pair of twins - were rendered unconscious by smoke. Kimberly died within hours at Children's Hospital. Neither girl was breathing when rescue personnel reached them, and the 13-year-old is still in critical condition after having been placed in a hyperbaric chamber.
A home insurance claim for the house, according to the Maryland Gazette, would need to account for $350,000 worth of damage.
The cause of the fire has not yet been officially settled, but investigators did not have any cause to suspect foul play as of Wednesday evening.
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