8 die in Chicago apartment fire, including 6 kids
CHICAGO — Eight people, including six children, were killed when a fire broke out before dawn Sunday at a Chicago apartment in one of the deadliest fires in the nation’s third-largest city in years, officials say.
Two other people were hospitalized in very critical condition, Chicago Fire Department spokesman Larry Merritt said. One of the children who died was an infant, according to Fire Commissioner Jose Santiago.
“We have not had this in many, many, many years — this amount of fatalities and injuries in one location,” he said.
A makeshift memorial along a nearby sidewalk included crosses for each child who died — a small Mickey Mouse doll set next to one.
Jessie Cobos said he lost three children in the fire.
“We’re asking God to protect us, and he’ll heal our hearts,” Cobos said. “We’ve got to love each other today because tomorrow is not promised.”
Officials did not release the names or ages of the victims, all of whom were in the same residence, Merritt said. The cause of the blaze is under investigation.
A woman who saw the blaze as she was returning home from work alerted people and gave them a chance to escape, Santiago said. She called 911 around 4 a.m., then began knocking on doors in the Little Village area, a largely Latino neighborhood on the city’s southwest side.
“So the female who did that saved a lot of lives,” Santiago said.
At least two buildings caught fire, one of them described by fire department officials as a coach house.
Video showed smoke coming from windows of a three-story building’s stone facade, with flames engulfing the back. Police officers helped push a stretcher toward an ambulance, while a paramedic simultaneously performed CPR. One woman lay on a street crying while someone tried to comfort her.
The fire was put out by around 5 a.m., fire officials said. At least one firefighter was injured and was hospitalized in good condition.
Merritt said investigators did not find working smoke detectors.
The Chicago Tribune contributed to this report.