Bronx Fire: Apartment Building Fire in Bronx Is New York City’s Deadliest Blaze in Decades (Published 2022) (2024)

At least 19 people, including nine children, were killed in a fire in a Bronx apartment building on Sunday morning, in what officials described as one of the city’s worst fires in recent memory. Mayor Eric Adams said it was likely caused by a malfunctioning space heater.

The fire started just before 11 a.m. in a duplex apartment on the second and third floors of the building, on East 181st Street, according to the Fire Department.

Firefighters arrived within three minutes and encountered smoke that extended the entire height of the 19-story building, said the fire commissioner, Daniel A. Nigro.

He added that “the smoke conditions in this building were unprecedented,” and that victims had suffered from severe smoke inhalation.

Crews entering the building found victims “on every floor” and were taking them out in “cardiac and respiratory arrest,” he said.

Fire officials said the number of fatalities is likely to climb.

“The numbers are horrific,” Mr. Adams said at a news conference on Sunday afternoon outside the apartment building, adding, “This is going to be one of the worst fires that we have witnessed during modern times.”

More than 60 were injured, and those with life-threatening injuries were taken to five Bronx hospitals. Roughly 200 firefighters battled the blaze, officials said.

Commissioner Nigro said the fire started in a bedroom on the third floor where a space heater was being used. Once the fire spread in that apartment, individuals ran out and left the door open, which helped fuel the fire and allowed the smoke to spread. “We’ve spread the word, ‘close the door, close the door’” to keep a fire contained, he said.

The fire only spread in the apartment where it started and in the hallway, but the smoke made its way through the whole building.

The 120-unit building, at 333 East 181st Street near Tiebout Avenue, was built in 1972, according to city records.

About 25 windows facing Webster Avenue were blown out. Sheets hung from some of the windows, billowing in the wind.

Kelly Magee, a spokeswoman for the property owners, said that the fire alarm system was working and that there were no known problems with the smoke alarms. Commissioner Nigro said one of the first calls about the fire came from a neighbor who heard the smoke alarms going off.

Some firefighters ran out of oxygen but kept up the effort to rescue people. “It certainly is traumatizing when we can’t save lives,” the commissioner said.

The city Department of Buildings said in a statement that a preliminary investigation determined the building remained stable and that displaced residents were offered relocation assistance by the American Red Cross.

A city official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the fire was still under investigation, said fire marshals believe the space heater had been running for several days uninterrupted. The residents were using the heater to supplement the building’s heat, which was on, officials said.

Gov. Kathy Hochul and Senator Chuck Schumer joined Mayor Adams at the news conference in what they called a show of unity among city, state and federal governments.

“We are indeed a city in shock,” Governor Hochul said. “We will not forget you. We will not abandon you.”

Apartment doors left open during fires have featured in some of the city’s worst blazes, including a Bronx fire in 2017 that left 13 people dead. The fire was started by a young boy playing with the stove in his family’s first-floor apartment and quickly tore through the building.

The building where Sunday’s deadly fire occurred is in Fordham Heights in the West Bronx. Built in 1972, it has no fire escapes, like most modern high-rises, and residents must rely on the stairwells in the event of an emergency.

Officials said the fire called to mind the fire at the Happy Land nightclub in 1990 in the Bronx, which killed 87 people. The club, which operated illegally, had no sprinklers, and several exits were blocked off with roll-down security shutters.

Chelsia Rose Marcius, Eduardo Medina and Matthew Haag contributed reporting.

Wesley Patterson was in the bathroom just before 11 a.m. on Sunday when his girlfriend knocked on the door to say that she saw flames coming out of another unit.

It took only moments for the apartment to fill with smoke, said Mr. Patterson, who has lived in the building for 20 years.

“We were just trying to breathe,” Mr. Patterson, 28, said. He rushed with his girlfriend and her brother, who lives with the couple, to a back window.

He tried to open it but the frame was so hot that he burned his hands. When he got the window open, he started screaming to firefighters who were helping a family in apartment 3M. The firefighters couldn’t get to them just yet, he said.

Mr. Patterson said he had to keep opening and shutting the window to keep smoke from pouring in as he called for help.

“I was yelling, ‘Please help me! Please come get us!’” he said.

The family tried to open the door, but the apartment flooded with even more smoke.

“I was thinking about my son, and I was wondering if I was ever going to see him again,” Mr. Patterson said.

It was around 11:20 a.m. that Mr. Patterson said he and his family were pulled out of the window by firefighters.

“I’m glad we made it out safe, but I still can’t believe it happened,” he said.

Dana Nicole Campbell, 47, was at a nearby park, working as a groundskeeper for the city, when one of her four teenage children called to say that smoke was coming into their apartment on the third floor. Ms. Campbell said she told them to put damp towels by the foot of the door to prevent more smoke from entering the apartment, and to barricade themselves inside the apartment.

Then she raced to the building and got there in time to see her children jump out of a third-floor window. They landed on a mattress and garbage bags that people had put there as a makeshift landing pad. Later, Ms. Campbell said she was grateful her children were unharmed.

“You can be here tomorrow with broken legs,” she said. “You can’t be here tomorrow with smoke inhalation.”

Firefighters helped Cristal Diaz escape with her two aunts, aged 49 and 65, and three cousins from their smoke-filled apartment on the 15th floor. Ms. Diaz, who moved from the Dominican Republic two years ago, took only her phone and identification with her when she left. “We don’t know what to do right now, and tomorrow I’m supposed to work,” said Ms. Diaz, who works as a cashier. The family is currently staying with friends.

Ms. Diaz said she was drinking coffee, as she does every morning, when the disaster struck.

“I thought, ‘Is this going to be the last time I enjoy coffee with my family?’ Ms. Diaz, 27, recalled, still in shock.

Members of the Wague family stood on the corner of Tiebout Avenue and Folin Street, huddled together, some under a blanket, after escaping their third-floor apartment.

Mamadou Wague was awakened by one of his children. “I get up, and there’s smoke in the kids’ rooms,” Mr. Wague, 47, said.

As the family rushed out of the apartment, one of Mr. Wague’s children cried that their sister, Nafisha, 8, was missing. Mr. Wague sprinted to her room and found her sitting on her bed, screaming, he said. Mr. Wague grabbed her and ran out.

Ahouss Balima, 20, lived on the ninth floor of the building, along with his three younger sisters and parents. He and his family had been asleep on Sunday morning when he was awakened by the sound of someone screaming for help.

Mr. Balima went to wake up his family, and they rushed downstairs, only to be told by firefighters on the 6th floor that they couldn’t go down any further because it was too dangerous.

After eventually being rescued by firefighters, one of his sisters was taken to a hospital, and she was still in critical condition on Sunday night.

By 3:30 p.m., the fire was under control, and a faint smell of smoke lingered in the air. Several residents stood nearby. Some wore sneakers, others had winter coats, and a few had blankets wrapped around their shoulders. A few people huddled under nearby scaffolding to escape the biting wind. Several held their phones close to their faces to assure concerned family members that they were alive.

A malfunctioning space heater caused the fire in a Bronx apartment Sunday, and an open door to the apartment allowed thick, black smoke to quickly fill the high-rise building, Fire Department Commissioner Daniel Nigro said.

The blaze started just before 11 a.m. in a duplex apartment on the second and third floors of the building, on East 181st Street, according to the Fire Department.

At a news conference on Sunday, Mayor Eric Adams and Mr. Nigro said that the fire was caused by an electric space heater that malfunctioned, but they didn’t give additional details. The Commissioner said he believed the heat was working in the building and that the heater was being used to supplement the heat.

The fire started in a bedroom of the apartment, Mr. Nigro said.

“The door to that apartment, unfortunately, when the residents left, was left open. It did not close by itself,” Mr. Nigro said. “The smoke spread throughout the building, thus the tremendous loss of life and other people fighting for their lives right now in hospitals all over the Bronx.”

Because the door was open, the fire reached the hall, Mr. Nigro said, but it never extended anywhere else in the building.

One of the first calls about the fire came from a neighbor who heard the smoke alarm, the commissioner said.

The building had 120 units, including studios and four-bedroom apartments. The building had internal stair wells, not external fire escapes, and residents should have known where escape routes were located, Mr. Nigro said. However, the volume of smoke likely obstructed people’s ability to escape, he added.

The Department of Buildings sent inspectors to conduct a structural stability inspection of the building.

The building, named Twin Parks North West, is home to working-class families, many of whom depend on Section 8 rental assistance. Several residents said that the fire alarms were heard so frequently, they were often ignored. Dana Nicole Campbell, who lives on the third floor, said the fire alarms in the building go off five or six times a day. When they do, she said, “I roll my eyes.”

Kelly Magee, a spokeswoman for the property owners, said that the fire alarm system was working and that there were no known problems with the smoke alarms.

Some victims were found trapped in the stairwells and others in their apartments, and one man narrowly escaped when the elevator arrived as he was losing consciousness, Mr. Feliz said.

The specific vouchers they use in the development are not transferable, Mr. Feliz said, adding that it would be difficult for them to find permanent housing.

“It’s a tragedy,” he said. “We’re talking about some of the poorest New Yorkers.”

The Bronx building is owned by a group of investors, LIHC Investment Group, Belveron Partners and Camber Property Group, who bought it as part of a $166 million deal in early 2020 for eight rent-regulated buildings in the borough.

Camber Property Group, which operates affordable housing properties across New York City, most of which are in the Bronx, is one of the fastest-growing developers of affordable housing in the city.

Camber’s co-founder, Rick Gropper, was named as a member of Mr. Adams’s transition team for housing issues before Mr. Adams took office this month.

“We are devastated by the unimaginable loss of life caused by this profound tragedy,” the property owners said in a statement. “We are cooperating fully with the Fire Department and other city agencies as they investigate its cause, and we are doing all we can to assist our residents. Our thoughts are with the families and friends of those who lost their lives or were injured, and we are here to support them as we recover from this horrific fire.”

Azi Paybarah contributed to this article.

A fire at a Bronx apartment building on Sunday that killed 17 people, including eight children, started in a duplex apartment on a low floor but sent heavy smoke throughout the building, which likely prevented residents from escaping.

Daniel A. Nigro, the fire commissioner of the New York City Fire Department, said at a news conference on Sunday evening that the cause of the fire started from a malfunctioning electric space heater. But officials were working to investigate why the smoke spread so rapidly throughout the 19-story building and how it traveled.

The fire started just before 11 a.m. in a duplex apartment on the second and third floors of the building, on East 181st Street, according to the Fire Department.

Commissioner Nigro said that the fire consumed the apartment with the space heater and part of the hallway. When the residents of the apartment fled, the door to the building was left open, and it did not close by itself, he said.

Leaving the door open likely helped fuel the fire and quickly send smoke throughout the building, preventing residents from escaping, said Daniel Madrzykowski, a director of research for the Underwriters Laboratories’ Fire Safety Research Institute.

Dr. Madrzykowski said when a door is left open, like in Sunday’s fire, it provides a source of air that can help fuel a fire, which “essentially acts as a pump.”

“So as people open up the building in trying to escape, the smoke keeps blocking their path, blocking their egress,” Dr. Madrzykowski said. “The smoke is hot. The smoke is toxic. Limits visibility. It’s irritating to the eyes. It will sting your eyes, and make your eyes water. It’s a very difficult situation.”

Commissioner Nigro said the building did not have fire escapes, only interior stairways, leaving the residents with only a short window to flee as smoke made its way throughout the building.

“The smoke spread throughout the building, thus the tremendous loss of life and other people fighting for their lives right now in hospitals all over the Bronx,” Commissioner Nigro said. “I think some of them could not escape because of the volume of smoke.”

According to the Fire Research Division of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, when oxygen mixes with heated gases in a building, energy levels can increase, which can cause a fire to grow rapidly.

When the oxygen level in a structure drops or is depleted, a fire decays, and heat from the fire and temperatures drop, according to the research division.

“Closing the door limits smoke spread and limits the oxygen that is available for combustion,” Dr. Madrzykowski said.

The high-rise in the Bronx where 17 people died in a fire on Sunday was home to many African immigrants who chose their apartments for the close-knit community and proximity to local mosques.

A significant number of the building’s residents were practicing Muslims and originally from Gambia, Mayor Eric Adams said at a news conference on Sunday.

He spoke about respecting cultural and religious needs, especially related to burial rites, and emphasized that support would be provided regardless of immigration status.

Gov. Kathy Hochul reassured residents of the building, on East 181st Street, that she would not forget them. She announced plans to establish a victims’ compensation fund to help secure new housing and pay for burials and other costs.

“Tonight is a night of tragedy and pain, and tomorrow we begin to rebuild,” she said. “We rebuild their lives and give them hope. Especially those who came all the way from Africa. Gambians in search of a better life right here in this great borough, the borough of the Bronx. They’re part of our family.”

Smoke traveled throughout the 19-story building and victims suffered from severe smoke inhalation, said Daniel A. Nigro, the city’s fire commissioner. More than 60 residents were injured.

Hassane Badr’s family, a total of 11 people from Mali, including his parents and siblings, lived in a three-bedroom apartment on the third floor. Two siblings, both children, were killed, he said, adding that a 25-year-old cousin remained unaccounted for.

At Jacobi Medical Center, Mr. Badr waited for news about his 12-year-old brother, who was suffering from serious smoke inhalation. A 5-year-old sister, who was also injured, was at another hospital.

He said there was no time yet to grieve or even think about burials.

“I’m thinking like I’m dreaming, this is not true. You hear people crying, my goodness,” said Mr. Badr, 28. “To be honest, I’m not believing it right now.”

He said his family had lived at the high-rise for at least six years, drawn to it in part for its African connection and the availability to nearby mosques.

Ahouss Balima, 20, who lived on the ninth floor with his parents and three younger sisters, who are all from Burkina Faso, said that the building’s community was “very close.”

“We meet up all the time, apartment to apartment,” said Mr. Balima. “We all know each other.”

At St. Barnabas Hospital, Musa Kabba, a local imam, said he was waiting with anguished relatives for victims to be identified. Several residents attended his mosque on Webster Avenue, the Masjid-Ur-Rahmah, he said. The mosque is a four-minute walk from the building.

“We know that people died,” Mr. Kabba said. “We don’t know who they are.”

Salim Drammeh, the president of the Gambian Youth Organization, said that the nonprofit’s center was blocks away from the apartment building and had opened to collect donations and provide emotional support to the community. He said that contributions, both in person and to an online fund-raiser, just started “flooding in.”

“This is how our community is; we love this community,” said Mr. Drammeh, 26. “Every time anybody is in trouble, we show up for each other.”

Ana Ley, Eduardo Medina and Sean Piccoli contributed reporting.

Jan. 5, 2022

A dozen people, including eight children, were killed when fire overwhelmed a crowded rowhouse in Philadelphia, in one of the deadliest residential fires in the nation’s recent history. Investigators are looking into the possibility that the fire was caused by a child playing with a lighter near a Christmas tree, according to a warrant application that was filed in state court.

Aug. 26, 2018

Ten children died when a fire broke out in an apartment building in the Little Village section of Chicago. The children were attending a sleepover at the time. The building’s owner was cited with more than 40 building code violations.

Dec. 28, 2017

Thirteen people died when a five-alarm fire engulfed an apartment building in the Bronx, the deadliest blaze in New York City in more than a quarter of a century. The fire started when a 3-year-old boy was playing with the burners of a stove, the authorities said at the time.

March 21, 2015

A hot plate warming food for the Sabbath sparked a fire that tore through the Brooklyn home of an Orthodox Jewish family, killing seven children. There were no smoke detectors on the first floor of the home where the fire broke out or on the second floor where the family members had been sleeping.

April 3, 2008

Ten people, including eight children, were killed when a fire swept through a home in Brockway, Pa., a rural town about 100 miles northeast of Pittsburgh. The victims ranged in age from 4 months to 40 years old.

March 7, 2007

Ten people, nine of them children, died after a fire, sparked by the frayed cord of a space heater, gutted a four-story rowhouse in the High Bridge neighborhood of the Bronx. The victims were members of an extended family of immigrants from Mali.

Dec. 24, 1989

A Christmas Eve fire at a high-rise hotel that had been converted into apartments for seniors in Johnson City, Tenn., killed 16 people, including 14 residents. The fire, which started in the living room of one of the apartments, injured 30 people, including 15 firefighters.

March 22, 1987

Seven people were killed, including three trapped by flames in their 33d-floor apartment who jumped to their deaths, when a smoky blaze raced up a garbage chute and raged through the top floors of a 35-story building at the Schomburg Plaza apartments at the northeast edge of Central Park. Fire officials said the sprinkler system in the chute failed to function, apparently because the water had been turned off.

May 13, 1985

A police helicopter dropped a bomb on a rowhouse in West Philadelphia where members of the communal, anti-government group MOVE lived, an action that the City Council apologized for in 2020 after decades of intense criticism. Eleven people, including five children, were killed, and more than 60 nearby homes were destroyed by the fire.

July 5, 1982

A man with a lengthy criminal record and a history of mental illness intentionally started a fire in an apartment building in Waterbury, Conn., after an argument with a niece who lived there. The fire killed 14 people and displaced more than 100 residents. The man was sentenced to two consecutive life terms for the deadly arson.

A deadly fire Sunday in the Bronx shocked officials, with Gov. Kathy Hochul saying she was “horrified” by the fast-moving blaze, and Representative Adriano D. Espaillat saying he was heartbroken and praying for the victims.

The fire’s thick, choking smoke quickly engulfed the apartment building, making the evacuation difficult. Many of those killed were children.

Governor Hochul said on Twitter on Sunday that the “entire State of New York stands with New York City.”

Many of the fire’s victims appeared to be immigrants, some from Gambia. Mr. Espaillat, a former undocumented immigrant himself who represents the parts of the Bronx, Harlem and Upper Manhattan, said on Twitter that the “scale of this tragedy is unimaginable.” Senator Chuck Schumer of New York also said on Twitter that he was praying for the victims, adding, “I stand with everyone in the Bronx.”

The fire was also devastating for Mayor Eric Adams, who described it as “horrific.”