3-year-old playing with burners on stove sparks deadly fire in Bronx
A preschooler toying with the burners on his mother’s stove accidentally sparked New York City’s deadliest fire in decades, an inferno that quickly overtook an apartment building and killed 12.
NEW YORK — A preschooler toying with the burners on his mother’s stove accidentally sparked New York City’s deadliest fire in decades, an inferno that quickly overtook an apartment building and blocked the main escape route, the fire commissioner said Friday.
A dozen people died, and four others were fighting for their lives a day after the flames broke out in the century-old building near the Bronx Zoo.
The 3½-year-old-boy, his mother and another child were able to flee their first-floor apartment. But they left the apartment door open behind them, and it acted like a chimney that drew smoke and flames into a stairwell. From there, the fire spread throughout the five-story building, authorities said.
The city housing department said investigators would look into why the door did not close automatically, though Mayor Bill de Blasio said there was “nothing problematic about the building that contributed to this tragedy.”
At least 20 people scrambled out via fire escapes on a bitterly cold night, but others could not.
“People had very little time to react,” Fire Commissioner Daniel Nigro said. Firefighters arrived in just over three minutes and saved some people, but “this loss is unprecedented.”
Fernando Batiz said his sister, Maria Batiz, 56, and her 8-month-old granddaughter also died, though the baby’s mother survived.
“The smoke, I guess, overcame her. Everything happened so quick,” Batiz said. He described his sister, a home care attendant, as a selfless person who helped him when he was homeless.
“I don’t know what to think. I’m still in shock,” he said.
One family lost four members: Karen StewartFrancis; her daughters, Kiley Francis, 2, and Kelly Francis, 7; and their cousin, 19-year-old Shawntay Young, relatives said. Stewart-Francis’ husband, Holt Francis, was hospitalized, the family said.
“I don’t know what to do, and I don’t know how to feel,” said Stewart-Francis’ mother, Ambrozia Stewart. “Four at one time — what do I do?”
The 26-unit apartment building was required to have self-closing doors, which swing shut on their own to keep fires from spreading, city Housing Preservation and Development Department spokesman Matthew Creegan said. Investigators will look at whether the door to the apartment was defective or if an obstruction prevented it from closing, he said.
No self-closing door violations were issued during an inspection in August, though the city would not have examined every apartment, Creegan said. Such violations are common: The city cited 7,752 of them last year.
Excluding 9/11, Thursday’s fire was the city’s deadliest since 87 people were killed at a social club in the same Bronx neighborhood in 1990.