Local News FIRE 41. ;E. Above: More than 30 apartments were damaged. Left: Several apartments were completely gutted. A firefighter deploys a hose. continued from page 1 completed a preliminary inquiry. They likely will have no conclusions about what started the fire until next week, said Chief Cecil Dawson of Royal Oak Township's Department of Public Safety. Twelve units were completely de- stroyed. More than 30 units — some in the adjoining building — were dam- aged by smoke and flames. No one died. No one was injured. But many Russian Jews, who arrived here with nothing more than a suitcase, saw their new lives in America literally go up in smoke. Cr) "Today I start my life from scratch." Polina Bilmes LU CC F- UJ LU F- 30 "They're just getting their feet on the ground and now they've lost ev- erything," said Sandy Hyman, direc- tor of Resettlement Service. Two families with college students had just purchased computers. Gone. A mastectomy patient recently re- ceived a costly prosthesis. Gone. One woman's memories of her mother were contained on a single VCR tape. Gone. "There are multiple tragedies involved in this," Ms. Hyman said. Private organizations within the Jewish and gentile communities re- sponded quickly. On the day of the fire, representa- tives of Resettlement Service, Jewish Family Service, the Red Cross and Kadima showed up to help feed and relocate the home- less. Kadima, largely funded by the Jewish com- munity, is a non-sectarian agency that provides sup- port for adults with mental illness. Two Kadima clients lived in the building that burned down. Andy Beider, a member of Congregation Shaarey Zedek, was listening to his car radio on his way home from work Thursday evening when he heard about the disaster. He made a detour to Northgate to offer his family's home as temporary shel- ter to fire victims. But the Ramada Inn in Southfield already had signed victims up for rooms, and many others spent the night with friends and family members. In the Northgate club- house, the Red Cross provided hot foodand worked with bi-lingual social workers from Resettlement Below: Firefighter Dave Theibert cleans up. Service to meet the needs of the dis- placed. By Friday, Northgate administra- tors had relocated all victims to va- cant units throughout the complex. The Bilmes family — Polina, Gregory and sons Igor, 14, and Eugene, 6 — moved into a Northgate apartment a block away from their old home, which was destroyed. Last Thursday, Eugene was play- ing outside during recess at nearby Avery elementary school when he looked up to see smoke curling up from the Northgate area on Greenfield Road and Lincoln.