28-year-old woman killed in Union Township fire identified

CLERMONT COUNTY, Ohio (WXIX) - Union Township police on Wednesday identified the woman killed in Monday’s Union Township fire as 28-year-old Emily Black.

The blaze broke out around 9 p.m. Monday in a condominium complex on Mapleport Way.

Black and a man who told neighbors he was her boyfriend were inside the condo with their dog at the time.

The man was able to make it out with severe burns.

A neighbor of the couple who works as a nurse ran to the man’s aid and held him back from returning to the blaze as he screamed and wept. The nurse, Lynn Shears, described the scene in a harrowing account on Tuesday.

“It’s really sad, because I know he was working so hard to get to his girlfriend,” Shears said. “It was pretty hard to see that... that he loved her so much. I’ve been shaken up all day. I don’t want to cry, but I’m ready to.”

The man who survived told his neighbors he heard an explosion before the fire and that he believed a battery had exploded.

Investigators say it could take weeks before they learn the exact cause of the fire.