FORT COLLINS, Colo.—A fire that sent one person to the hospital and displaced two residents has been determined to be accidental.
It started in a bedroom Saturday night at the Northern Hotel when a woman who uses an oxygen tank for medical reasons dropped a phone on the floor, firefighters said. When she retrieved it, she inadvertently came too close to a burning candle on a dresser that ignited the oxygen tubing.
A sprinkler system doused the fire.
The woman was released from a hospital Saturday, the Poudre Fire Authority said.
Firefighters said the hotel, built in 1897, suffered a fire in 1975 that mostly destroyed the third and fourth floors. The building did not have a fire sprinkler system at the time. A sprinkler system was installed in a project completed in 2001.
