INDIANAPOLIS — Investigators believe someone intentionally set a building on fire early Friday morning, while a man was asleep inside of it.
Several neighbors called 911 around 3:30 a.m., after waking up to flames shooting in the sky at a building on the southwest side of Indianapolis, near the intersection of Belmont Avenue and Howard Street.
IFD says the 48 year old man inside the burning building wasn't responding when they found him, but after emergency crews did CPR on him, they say he was awake and talking in the ambulance when arrived at Eskenazi Hospital.
Friday afternoon, the man was in critical condition as fire investigators began their search to learn who started the fire and why.
"There was a loud boom and then we opened the curtain," neighbor Daisha Eaker recalled, saying when she saw the flames, all she could think about were the children she knew lived in the building that was now on fire.
"That's all I was worried about. That's why I called 911, I was just worried there was children in there," Eaker said.
According to IFD, when fire crews got on scene they had to get the fire under control before they could go inside to search for anyone.
When they did though, there was only one way in and one way out.
"The most important thing about this is there was no egress from this structure, other than the single door that was in the middle of all that fire," said IFD Battallion Chief Rita Reith.
When crews finally got inside, they found a man unconscious.
"We found out later, after we didn't locate any children or other persons inside the structure that there is indeed a family that lives here," Reith explained.
IFD says the man's wife and two children were out of town.
Now they'll return to husband and father in the hospital and the garage they had converted into a home, gone.
IFD says other homes nearby were also damaged.
Now the investigation into the arson begins.
"They are starting to talk to neighbors," said Reith.
Daisha Eaker could be one of them.
"That's the first time I've saw a fire like that personally, up close and in person and it was just horrible, horrible, horrible," said Eaker.
According to IFD, there was no smoke alarm in the building when the fire broke out.