By MONA NAIR
6 News Reporter
KNOXVILLE (WATE) - Lightning associated with storms that moved through Knoxville Tuesday afternoon may have caused an apartment fire.
Eighteen residents have been displaced by the fire.
Witnesses say they saw lightning hit the building on Cedarpark Lane just before the flames broke out.
One apartment was set on fire by the lightning strike and the fire then spread the three neighboring units.
Crystal Diaz said she heard a loud "pop" when the lightning struck.
"And we looked out he window and we seen a lot of smoke," she said. "We stepped outside and that's where we seen this apartment building and it was fire. All the families that lived in the apartment building had come outside and the smoke was really bad."
Diaz and her husband, Ricardo, helped residents clear from the area and take shelter in a nearby apartment. Diaz said one of the residents forced from the apartments is an elderly woman confined to a wheelchair.
Representatives from the American Red Cross were on hand to help find assistance for the displaced families.
Fire officials have not officially given a cause of the fire.
Witnesses say they saw lightning hit the apartment building on Cedarpark Lane just before flames broke out.
