A Carnegie Mellon University senior ran from door to door through the converted "Millionaire's Row" mansion in Shadyside to warn the 14 other residents about fire and smoke filling the three-story structure.

	Darrell Sapp, Post-Gazette Zachary Witman and his mother, DeeDee Witman, stand in front of 5105 Fifth Ave., Shadyside, where an electrical fire started on the third floor, Wednesday night. Witman lost everything in his third-floor apartment and was only able to get his keys. His mother flew in from Providence, R.I., to help. The mansion was built in 1906. Click photo for larger image.

"By the time that I realized we couldn't put the fire out with extinguishers, I kind of realized that it was imperative to get everybody out of the house," Zachary Witman said yesterday.

Everyone got outside safely, but the massive 98-year-old stone home, designed to resemble a Scottish castle, was seriously damaged by the four-alarm fire.

"It was a great place to be. It was a big, scary Halloween mansion right on Fifth Avenue," said Witman. "It wasn't your average dorm room."

Pittsburgh Fire Chief Peter Micheli said the cause appeared to be accidental and estimated damage to the third floor where the fire started at $250,000. The first and second floors of the former mansion at 5105 Fifth Ave. had water and smoke damage.

The fire broke out around 11:30 p.m. Wednesday and was brought under control shortly before 1 a.m. Witman, 21, had been watching television in another apartment in the former mansion when one of his two roommates, Kristen Bernard, screamed there was a fire in his third-floor room.

"There was so much smoke. We tried to open up a window. It was a real fire. It was scary in there," Witman said.

He grabbed a fire extinguisher, but soon realized it was futile to try to put the fire out, and began telling people to get out.

The 15 residents, most of them Carnegie Mellon students, spent yesterday reclaiming belongings, finding temporary housing and saying how much they will miss living in the imposing house with the gargoyles.

Built in 1906, the mansion's entire first floor is made of quarter-sawn oak and features a grand staircase. Designed by the Pittsburgh firm of Carpenter and Crocker, the Elizabethan residence was built by Willis McCook, a lawyer who represented Henry Clay Frick in his titanic legal battle with Andrew Carnegie.

The mansion is owned by Marie and Emil Bonavita Jr., who live nearby on Amberson Avenue.

"I was just so glad everybody got out of there," said Marie Bonavita, who was married in the home's elegant dining room 39 years ago this April.

Her husband, whose large hands were stained with ash and dirt, called the estimates to repair the damage "frightening" and said that at his age, the task of restoring the home was daunting.

Emil Bonavita's father bought the home in 1949 at a sheriff's sale and spent years restoring it. By the 1960s, the mansion had been divided into apartments for Carnegie Mellon students.

Anthony Butts, a professor of English and poetry at Carnegie Mellon, returned yesterday to his second-floor apartment to retrieve what he values most -- two manuscripts of poetry and his computer.

Butts said he watched students grab fire extinguishers, but he never saw actual flames.

"All I saw was a lot of smoke," he said. "I really regret having to move from here."

Butts added that the Bonavitas were excellent landlords who had recently installed new smoke detectors.

Tim Michael, Carnegie Mellon's director of housing services, said the university was helping students displaced by the fire.

"We're going to offer them on-campus apartments or spaces in dormitories," Michael said, adding that emergency loans have been arranged so the students can replace their textbooks.