Five people were left homeless last night after a fire ripped through a Contoocook apartment building. One cat died in the flames, and at least one more was missing, according to fire officials.

Amy Smart was inside her 167 Maple St. apartment when the three-alarm fire started. Her landlord pounded on the door and yelled for her to get out. As she escaped the building, Smart said, she saw an entire section of apartments on fire.

"When I came around the house, it was just a huge fire," she said last night while huddling to stay warm in sweatpants and a sweatshirt.

Smart usually lives with her two young daughters. Luckily, she said, they were not home when the fire broke out about 7 p.m.

"I'm just scared. I feel really, really bad for (the landlord,)" she said.

Smart said fire officials told her that her apartment suffered smoke damage but that her belongings were not destroyed. For occupants in the rear of the building, the fire destroyed most of their belongings.

Officials were unsure last night how the fire started. The building was divided into three sections of apartments, each connected by a breezeway. The fire started somewhere in the rear section, destroying the entire apartment and leaving the other two with severe smoke damage.

"It was huge," said Vicki Baronas, who could see the flames from her Orchard Way home. "Unbelievable."

It took firefighters about 20 minutes to get the fire knocked down and another two hours before it was fully under control. Firefighters, drenched with water, pulled heaps of clothing from the rear of the apartment building last night. They were expected to stay late into the night searching for hot spots and picking up thousands of feet of hose.

Firefighters from Hopkinton's Engine 2 were the first on scene, according to Fire Chief Richard Schaefer. When they arrived, the home was already fully engulfed. They used hoses to push the fire towards the rear of the building in an attempt to save other apartments from damage.

Dozens of firefighters from 10 towns were called, including Henniker, Bradford, Hillsboro, Weare, Webster, Bow, Henniker, Warner and Dunbarton. Chichester responded with a rescue truck, according to Bow Assistant Fire Chief Dick Pistey.

A Hopkinton firefighter, whose name was not released, was taken by ambulance to Concord Hospital with a minor leg injury, Schaefer said.

Displaced residents made arrangements to stay with relatives and friends last night, Schaefer said. The dead cat belonged to the landlords, who declined to comment last night. Fire officials did not immediately release the landlords' names.