Tenants at an apartment building along Martin Luther King Boulevard in Newark are being forced to evacuate their homes just before the holiday weekend begins

The order to get out came about after a leaking pipe flooded an apartment on the top floor. The damage then spread throughout the building, which is located at 737 MLK Boulevard.

At 2 a.m. on Thursday, the water caused a ceiling collapse within a fourth-floor apartment. It destroyed the unit and sent water down to those on the first floor.

Kevin Bennett lives in a first-floor apartment. The water that trickled down cut off his electricity.

“It’s a disaster, everything got ruined right before the holidays,” he said. “I’m supposed to be looking for an apartment today because you can’t do it over the weekend. Monday is a holiday.”

The flooding first took place in the fourth-floor apartment where Dominique Smith was living. She said that in the middle of the night her ceiling collapsed.

“This has been the most traumatizing thing I’ve ever experienced in life,” she said. “Before I got into a heavy sleep I hear a rain sound….the day before it was raining, so I’m thinking maybe a storm. Open my door. It’s my ceiling leaking…light fixture falls piece by piece. This started, that started. It just flooded into the whole building honestly.”

Everyone in the building is being offered a room at the Robert Treat Hotel and assistance in finding a new permanent home. The property manager says that on Tuesday he will get inside the building, assess the damage and begin restoration.

Newark City Code Enforcement will be at the building on that same day to monitor the repair.