Alex N. Gecan, Andrew Ford, Mike Davis, and Russ Zimmer

Asbury Park Press

OCEAN GROVE – "I've got to get out."

It was the shrill shouts that jolted Robert Biel awake in his home at the LaPierre Condominiums, a high-rise multifamily complex on Wesley Lake. Then Biel, 52, saw the embers raining down through the LaPierre building's atrium. He smelled smoke.

He knew they had to get out.

"Let's go!" he recalled shouting to his husband. "Get out!"

And so the two fled from their home in darkness, carrying what little they could, among the frightened residents of 40 households that were displaced by the early-morning, five-alarm fire that damaged seven buildings along the lake at Seaview and Beach avenues in this seashore Victorian community, according to Vito Gadaleta, business administrator for Neptune Township.

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Hours later, Biel still couldn't believe what happened. "(We) watched this horrific fire grow and grow and grow," hel said.

Officials said it could have been much worse.

"If anybody knows Ocean Grove, knows the dynamics of it, the buildings are extremely close together," said Neptune police Capt. Michael McGhee. "The firefighters did a phenomenal job knocking this thing down. This could easily have taken out a block."

The fire started about 5:10 a.m., according to McGhee, prompting the response of hundreds of first responders, including 11 fire departments. Police said they believe that the fire started in the defunct Warrington Hotel, located next door to the LaPierre, said McGhee.

The Warrington was destroyed by the time the firefighters began rolling out, reduced to a mere footprint. La Pierre Condominiums showed smoke from its upper floors throughout the morning and, when the fumes cleared, fire damage was visible across several floors. Vinyl sliding sloughed off one house to the east of where the Warrington stood. A house to the west was ripped open by flames. McGhee said the nearby Marlborough Condominium Development also was damaged, along with four other residential buildings.

The plume of smoke from the fire was visible four miles away. Ash and cinders drifted the two blocks to the boardwalk.

Though no civilians were injured, three firefighters were hurt, including one with an injury to the face and another suffering from smoke inhalation, according to Gadaleta. All three were treated and released from Jersey Shore University Medical Center by Friday afternoon.

First responders evacuated the block and barricaded off more of the surrounding area.

Strato Doumanis, 29, woke up in the La Pierre building before his neighbors were alerted. It was silent. He smelled smoke, at first thinking he left the stove on. Then he heard “very faint screams in the distance," he said.

“I paced around my apartment trying to find the source of the smell," Doumanis said.

“I ran to my window and it was literally raining embers, like a volcano had gone off next to the building,” Doumanis said. “When I opened my door, I could see even more of the raining embers and stuff coming directly into the middle of the building square. I was convinced the whole roof or top floor was on fire.”

Doumanis ran back into his ground floor studio, grabbed his cat, laptop bag, keys and a jacket and left, banging on neighbors’ doors to alert them. He still hadn’t heard any fire alarms.

“I started banging on doors around me and screaming. It was still silent at that point. Nobody knew. There were no alarms going off,” Doumanis said.

Flames also forced Patricia Eberle, 64, from her home in the La Pierre.

"I got out of bed and I opened my shade and it was just all flames hitting my window," Eberle said.

She panicked. She ran around her condo, trying to catch her cat, Romeo. But she couldn't.

OCEAN GROVE FIRE: A history of the Warrington Hotel

Eberle grabbed her cellphone and pocketbook. Police were banging on her door, telling her to leave.

"I've never been through anything like this in my lifetime," said Eberle. "Just a big ball of fire."

Later Friday morning, Eberle sought help at St. Paul's United Methodist Church on Embury Avenue, where the Red Cross established a reception center for those displaced by the fire. Disaster manager Kristee Laura said about 11:15 a.m. Friday that they had helped about 25 people and she encouraged more people to come by.

After Eberle was forced from her home, she was most worried about her cat. He's all she could think about. She hoped he was OK.

"He's my roommate, my best friend, my buddy," she said.

WATCH: Major fire breaks out in Ocean Grove

The Seaview Avenue fire is just the latest major fire to sweep through this seashore community, known for its cluster of quaint Victorian-era homes.

A former firefighter who now teaches the job at New Jersey City University said he was “just amazed” by the relative success firefighters had in Ocean Grove, given the number of obstacles working against them.

“These guys were faced with a major battle right from the start,” said Pat Boyle, chairman of the Fire Science Department and a 30-year firefighter. “The amount of fire that they had on arrival. They had to fear a quick extension of the fire from exposure, building to building.”

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Wood structures can combust much more easily than other building materials simply by being close to a hot-burning fire. Combine that with the close proximity of homes in Ocean Grove, and you have an almost insurmountable challenge, he said.

After seeing the videos of the blaze this morning, Boyle immediately thought of the apartment complex fire that left 500 homeless in Edgewater and a more recent fire in Maplewood that engulfed a complex under construction.

“Those guys (in Ocean Grove) did a tremendous job keeping that building (the La Pierre Condominiums) from going up,” he said.

The Rev. Rich Hendrickson, pastor at St. Paul's, is chaplain for the Ocean Grove Fire Department. He went to the fire scene after he got a text message about 5:30 a.m., checking in on firefighters and seeking out residents he knew evacuated. He coordinated with his youth pastor, Megan Faulkner, to open up the church, receiving evacuees just a couple hours after the fire.

"We feel very strongly that part of living out the gospel is to be present in the community in ways that matter," Hendrickson said.

The Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association is surveying the damage and determining how to respond, according to John DiGiamberardino, executive director and chief operating officer of the association. Property in Ocean Grove is owned by the Christian organization, which leases the land to homeowners and businesses through 99-year, renewable leases.

“The great thing about this community, not that we ever look forward to one of these things occurring, but this community has a great history of bonding together to help each other,” DiGiamberardino said.

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Neptune Mayor Michael Brantley said the township has been considering changes since late last year to the historic preservation architectural guidelines to make them more practical, noting that historic buildings can't make use some materials which are safer for fires.

"We’re looking at what they allow and don’t allow to make it easier to build and a little safer," the mayor said.

The mayor was pleased with the emergency response to the fire.

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“It was a very good cooperative effort between the emergency management team, the firemen and the citizens," he said. "I'm very proud of the effort they put out.”

The Monmouth County Fire Marshal's Office, the state fire marshal and Monmouth County Prosecutor's Office are investigating the cause of the blaze, according to Gadaleta, the business administrator for Neptune Township.

The Asbury Hotel in Asbury Park posted that their doors are open to those displaced from the fire if they need a place to stay. Kushner Cos. will offer discounted, furnished short-term rentals at Pier Village to those impacted by the fire. They can contact the leasing office at 732-923-0100.