A single-alarm fire woke up University Park North residents at 2:39 a.m. Wednesday, forcing a brief evacuation of 20 students and causing an estimated $250,000 in damages to university owned property, fire officials said.

The cause of the fire is still under investigation and the apartment has been declared uninhabitable for the time being, Lt. Mindy Talmadge of the San Francisco Fire Department said.

The blaze began in and was contained to unit 103 on the first floor of the three-story building, which housed at least one SF State student, said university spokeswoman Ellen Griffin. There were no injuries.

About 20 residents were evacuated, but some returned when SFFD had the fire under control at 3:21 a.m.
SFFD station 15 is directly across the street from the damaged apartment and the station was among the companies that responded to the fire.

Alex Thomas, a junior on the SF State men’s basketball team, said he was sleeping in his apartment, unit 203, directly above the fire.

Thomas said that at first he thought the alarm was a drill. An escape drill was held in his building a few weeks ago, he said, and the guard wanted to get a sound sleep for Wednesday’s game against CSU Monterey Bay.

“[I was] pissed off because we leave today for a game,” Thomas said before heading to school around 9 a.m. Wednesday.

Thomas and roommate Ryan Wessels, spent the remainder of the morning sleeping at a friend’s home in The Villas at Parkmerced.

Talmadge said that residents living in unit 103 did not ask for assistance from the Red Cross, and that the estimated damages of the resident’s belongings reached $40,000.