A family of three was left without a place to stay on New Year's Day when a fire tore through the upper floor of a two-level apartment in the Hurt Park housing complex in Southwest Roanoke.

The fire destroyed an upstairs bedroom and caused extensive water and smoke damage to the rest of the apartment in the 100 block of 18th Street, said Tiffany Bradbury, a spokeswoman for the fire department.

Isaiah Robertson was the first to notice something was wrong Sunday afternoon. The 11-year-old had been asleep in the upstairs bedroom when a loud "boom" awoke him. Electricity was jumping from a nearby wall socket.

He immediately ran downstairs to alert his sister Chiquita, 20, who had been watching television at the time. She also noticed smoke gathering at the top of the steps.

"All I said was Mama's bedroom is on fire," she said. "Then we got on our shoes and coats and ran outside." Their mother had been at the grocery store at the time.

It was not until they both arrived outside safely that they turned back to find flames rising at the bedroom window, Isaiah said.

Roanoke Fire-EMS crews responded to the emergency about 4 p.m. to find heavy smoke and fire showing, Bradbury said.

No one was injured, and the blaze was quickly contained to the bedroom area, but it caused extensive smoke, fire and water damage throughout the apartment, she said. Fire officials estimate the preliminary damage at $95,000 to $100,000, Bradbury said.

Chiquita Robertson said the family plans to stay temporarily with their grandmother, who lives nearby in Roanoke. She was not surprised to hear that her brother saw the wall socket sparking, saying the family had had problems before with faulty wiring.

"You have to flip on the hallway light a couple times before it turns on," she said. "There's been bad wiring in the apartment for a while now."

As of Sunday evening, the cause of the fire was still under investigation, Bradbury said, and the Red Cross had offered assistance to the family.