A 64-year-old woman is presumed dead after an overnight fire gutted her home in Widefield early Thursday.

The fire was reported about 1:15 a.m. at 475 Cielo Vista St., and firefighters from the Security Fire District and Fort Carson responded to the blaze, said to Lt. Jeff Kramer, a spokesman for the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office.

“Firefighters very quickly reported that the house was engulfed in flames,” he said.

There were six people, four dogs and two cats who lived in the house and all except the 64-year-old woman made it out, Kramer said. After the fire was out, firefighters found a body inside the home and assumed it is that of the woman. The El Paso County Coroner’s Office will conduct an autopsy on the body and confirm the identity, Kramer said.

Three others were injured, Kramer said. A 6-year-old boy suffered from smoke inhiliation, a 15-year-old girl had burns on her hands and an adult woman had burns on her feet. Another adult man and woman were not injured, Kramer said.

Neighbors said on Thursday night that an elderly woman with lung cancer lived in the rented home with her daughters and grandchildren. The family seems to have been mostly unknown to the neighbors, who saw the woman and her family as they smoked cigarettes outside or when a young boy came over for trick-or-treat.

The family was the second group to live in the rented home in the past 11 years, one neighbor said.

Someone in the family smelled smoke and warned the other family members, Kramer said. One of the residents ran to a neighbor’s house to call for help. Family members stayed in a neighbor’s house until help arrived, he said.

Fire investigators believe the destroyed home did not have smoke detectors, as it was built before fire codes required them, Kramer said. The cause of the fire is under investigation, he said.

The home was reduced to pungent charred smithereens. Two large pine trees in the front yard survived the conflagration, and a wooden swing still hung from one of the tree’s branches.

No other homes in the area were burned, although police and firefighters evacuated neighbors around 1 a.m., and allowed them to return to their homes just after 4 a.m., a neighbor said. The vinyl siding on one neighbor’s home was warped by the heat of the blaze next door.

—

Contact Maria St. Louis-Sanchez: 636-0274

Twitter @mariastlouis

Facebook Gazette Maria St. Louis-Sanchez

Investigators at the scene Thursday morning of a fatal overnight fire on Cielo Vista Street in Widefield. Photo by Mark Reis, The Gazette Photo by

Mark Reis, The Gazette

The house fire broke out about 1:15 a.m. Thursday. Photo by MARIA ST. LOUIS-SANCHEZ, THE GAZETTE

The house fire broke out about 1:15 a.m. Thursday. Photo by COURTESY KOAA.COM