Two police officers rescued a woman from her burning apartment in the Blawnox high-rise for the elderly early today.

Blawnox Officer Tom Duffy and O'Hara Officer Mike Pastorius were at the Citgo gas station on Freeport Road at 1:49 a.m., when a passerby pointed toward the high-rise near the Allegheny River on Center Avenue and told the officers it was on fire.

The officers spotted a woman on the balcony of her burning fifth-floor unit. They couldn't reach her through the flames, so they went to the sixth floor, grabbed a fire hose attached to a standpipe, and took it back to the fifth floor.

They entered the woman's apartment, dousing some of the flames, and reached the woman, Jean Guentner, 82, who remains hospitalized in serious condition with second-degree burns..

Dozens of police and firefighters responded and escorted 80 to 100 other residents from the building. They were taken to a nearby church, where Red Cross workers fed them this morning. Some were picked up by family members. It was unclear when the residents would be able to return to the apartment building, but restoration crews were on the scene before the last of the fire trucks left.

The fire was declared under control around 4 a.m.

One other resident was taken to the hospital for chest pains.

The cause of the fire hadn't been determined.

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