Abstract: At approximately 10:00 p.m. on May 3, 2002, Employees #1, #2, and #3, a jailer and two deputies, were working at the Mitchell County jail when a fire started in the storage room attached to the rear of the jail. The fire burned through the hollow core door separating the storage room from the jail and a plywood cover over an unused window between its holding cell and the storage room. When the fire burned through these two wooden items, the smoke from the fire was drawn directly into the jail through a hallway leading from the storage room and then through the holding cell by the chimney affect in the building created by the open windows on the second floor of the jail. Employees #1, #2, and #3 were exposed to the smoke while attempting to free inmates and suffered smoke inhalation injuries. The Employees were hospitalized.