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Breaking News

Palomar Hotel on Fire; One Woman Confirmed Dead

Aired August 16, 2001 - 07:57   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Oh witness. We are - we've been covering a Hollywood fire all morning out in California. Right now, we're going to take you to an eyewitness account of exactly what happened at the corner of Santa Monica and Western.

UNIDENTIFIED KTTV REPORTER: Tell me -- tell me what you saw after the explosion?

NAIS ORTISE (ph), WITNESS: I didn't saw nothing. I just came and saw people getting in fire and all that stuff.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is your name?

ORTISE: I'm Nais (ph).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Last name?

ORTISE: Ortise (ph).

UNIDENTIFIED KTTV REPORTER: Thank you.

LIN: All right, we just caught the last bit of what looked like a child talking about what happened this morning.

This is what we know. An explosion at about 3:41 a.m. Pacific time there in a residential hotel. She is one of apparently many children who live inside this building. Several families living in single room apartments in this hotel. So far confirmed one woman dead. She leapt to her death as she panicked while firefighters were trying to save her.

At this moment, you're looking at a picture right now of the building where firefighters are inside still searching for missing people.

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