MONTVILLE - An apartment complex suffered a partial roof collapse late Monday night that will at least temporarily displace nearly two dozen tenants.
Tenants of the Mountview apartment complex, which sits next door to St. Bernard High School, say they began to hear loud cracking just before midnight.
Shortly after those startling noises, several tenants say roof rafters came crashing through their ceilings.
At that point, emergency crews were dispatched to the scene, at 1591 Norwich – New London Turnpike, where tenants, living in one of the two buildings, were evacuated.
An engineer deemed the building on safe to live in until the entire roof structure is replaced. The property manager for the complex says that could take a couple of weeks, depending on the weather.
For now, the displaced residents are staying in New London's Red Roof Inn. The property manager says if tenants are not allowed to return to the building for a significant amount of time, other housing arrangements will be made for them.
According to a Montville building official, this complex has been forced to make numerous other structural corrections since it was built in the early 1970s. The engineer on site Tuesday afternoon was going to check the integrity of the complex's other apartment building to make sure its roof was structurally sound.
One tenant was allowed to return to his apartment Tuesday afternoon to retrieve his 13 cats.