PHOTOS: Floyd Guenther wanted cereal.
It was early Dec. 21, 2019, about 4 a.m. Quiet. Many of his neighbors at the Alpine Motel Apartments were asleep.
Nothing seemed unusual as he headed for the corner store, closing up his third-floor room and walking down a narrow hallway toward the building’s front stairwell.
Floyd Guenther told police he saw “a ball of fire” in the Alpine Motel Apartments, and that nothing happened when he pulled multiple fire alarms.
But on the first floor, where the stairs spit him out, he suddenly smelled smoke. Above him, near the front door, it gently hovered, swirling on the ceiling. He heard no beeping smoke detectors. No blaring fire alarm.
Peeking out from the stairwell landing and down the first floor hallway, he couldn’t see much. So he stepped a little farther out, peering beyond a vending machine and pair of fridges partially blocking the path.