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Fort Dodge Fire Rescue releases name of Sunday fire victim

The Fort Dodge Fire Department has released the name of the woman found deceased following a fire in her downtown Fort Dodge apartment on Sunday afternoon.

The department was called to a first-floor apartment at 629 Central Avenue just after 2 p.m. on Sunday, where they found heavy smoke in the apartment and resident Jeanne Miller, 67, unresponsive.

Miller was pronounced dead at the scene from injuries sustained in the fire and has been transported to the State Medical Examiner’s Office.

A neighbor in the apartment building had smelled smoke coming from Miller’s apartment and called 911.

According to FDFD Chief Steve Hergenreter, the fire was “mostly out” and in the “smoldering stage” when firefighters arrived.

“The fire was contained in the kitchen area and there was moderate smoke damage to the apartment,” Hergenreter said.

The fire did not spread to other apartments in the building.

Hergenreter said that the building-wide smoke alarms were not activated because the smoke from the fire did not spill out into the hallway to trigger the hallway alarm.

“In a higher occupancy building like that with multiple dwellings, the way the alarm system works is each apartment has smoke alarms in it that activate within that dwelling unit,” he said. “The hallway corridor alarms, if smoke gets out there, it activates one of those alarms and then it goes throughout the building.”

He said the alarms operated normally.

The cause of the fire is still under investigation.

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