After 8 Displaced In Skyway Mobile Home Park Fire, Community Starts Fundraiser

SKYWAY, WA - A fire that devastated three mobile homes at a mobile home park in Skyway late Tuesday night displaced two families and destroyed a mobile home used as a meeting place for the local Cham refugee community.

Nuk Seh Champa Seattle, a community group for the Cham living in the Seattle area, has started a fundraiser to help the families find new homes and replace their possessions. In total, four adults and four children were displaced by the fire. The Red Cross has been assisting the families since Wednesday.

"On Tuesday, July 11th, a fire ripped through three mobile homes and totally destroyed them. The fire has left two families displaced and all of their property destroyed. The third mobile home was used by the local community as a gathering place and a way to connect the small group of Cham, an underrepresented ethnic group from South East Asia, in the area. The devastating fire broke out at around 10:30 PM and sent one person to the hospital," Nuk Seh Champa Seattle wrote on the page.

The group is trying to raise $60,000 for the families, but as of Saturday had only raised about $1,500. Read more about the fundraiser here.

According to Skyway fire officials, the fire started accidentally in one of the mobile homes. The three mobile homes destroyed in the fire were part of the Empire View Mobile Home Park, but the units were separate from the main part of the park off of South 129th Street. Firefighters from Skyway, Renton, and Tukwila worked all night Tuesday to put out the fire.

A woman was injured in the fire, but her injuries were described as minor.

Cham people are from Cambodia and Vietnam, and have been subject to cultural persecution. Cham from Cambodia are majority Muslim, and many fled to the U.S. in the 1970s during the genocide under the Khmer Rouge regime. In Washington state, many Cham live in a community of modular homes in Lacey.

Images via GoFundMe/Skyway fire