People slide down bedsheets to escape LA motel fire

OS ANGELES (AP) — Some residents slid down knotted bedsheets or clambered down people standing on one another's shoulders to flee a raging Christmas night fire that injured six people and badly damaged a residential motel near downtown Los Angeles, authorities said today.

Two of the injured suffered critical burns and smoke inhalation, Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Erik Scott said. Five people were hospitalized, and the injured ranged in age from 28 to 73.

The fire, which broke out about 6 p.m. Thursday, was traced to a kitchen in one of the three-story motel's 135 units.

"First-arriving firefighters were immediately met by multiple challenges as they saw residents trying to escape from smoke-filled second-floor windows by climbing down bedsheets tied together or on human ladders of people standing on each other's shoulders," Scott said.

He said firefighters had to help several people out of the burning building, including some in wheelchairs.