Bronx Apartment Fire Kills At Least 17, Including 9 Children

At least 17 people, including nine children, are dead, and at least 44 others are injured from a Bronx apartment fire that New York officials are calling the city’s worst in over 30 years.

At a news briefing on Sunday, FDNY Commissioner Daniel Nigro said a blaze broke out inside a duplex apartment spanning the second and third floors of 333 E. 181st St., a 19-story building at the intersection of Tiebout Avenue and Folin Street in Fordham Heights, just before 10:50 a.m. that day.

Nigro added that the fire at the Twin Park apartments appeared to be sparked by a “malfunctioning electric space heater.” WABC added that the space heater allegedly set a mattress on fire.

“The fire [that] consumed that apartment [was] on two floors and part of the hallway. The door to that apartment, unfortunately, when the residents left, was left open. It did not close by itself. The smoke spread throughout the building, thus [creating] the tremendous loss of life and other people fighting for their lives right now all over the Bronx,” Nigro added.

Per reports, around 200 members of the New York City Fire Department responded to the blaze around 11 a.m. Nigro says officials were initially met with “very heavy smoke and very heavy fire” when they reached the first hallway.

After firefighters retrieved victims from all floors of the building, Nigro said many had suffered from cardiac and respiratory arrest due to smoke inhalation.

Ultimately, the fire was knocked out shortly before 1 p.m.

While confirming that nine children were among the dead, Mayor Eric Adams said at a news conference on Sunday afternoon that “this is going to be one of the worst fires we have witnessed in modern times here in the city of New York.”

On Monday, WABC reported that hospitals are desperately working to save the lives of more than a dozen victims critically injured by smoke in the fire. The outlet adds that patients are spread out among hospitals like Jacobi Medical Center, Westchester Medical Center, and New York Presbyterian Hospital/Cornell.

WABC also reported that many of the victims are Muslim immigrants from the West African nation of Gambia.

While the fire remains under investigation, Nigro says it currently “does not appear suspicious.”

Overall, Nigro urges all individuals to “close the door” when leaving residences to prevent events like this from happening again.

“Close the door. If you leave your apartment, the door should close behind you automatically, but it doesn’t always,” Nigro said. “But if you close the door, the smoke and fire spread is contained within that apartment instead of spreading out into the hall and up the stairs, and that’s what happened here, again.”