by The Associated Press
A fire in a Queens apartment building killed one person and left nearly two dozen civilians and six firefighters injured early Wednesday.
The second alarm fire started at 2:46 a.m. in a six-story building at 37-52 89th Street near Roosevelt Avenue in the Jackson Heights section. The blaze spread through the second and third floors of the building causing numerous injuries.
"It started in a bedroom of the second floor of an apartment," Sal Cassano, fire department chief of operations told WNBC-TV.
"There was a smoke detector that went off, it alerted the occupants to the apartment they were able to get out but there were people on the floors above that were injured." One unidentified person was killed in the fire, but the cause of death was not immediately known.
A total of 23 civilians, plus six firefighters were treated for various injuries including burns and smoke inhalation, fire officials said.
Six people were taken to Elmhurst Hospital in Queens. Three of them were children who were in stable but serious condition.
The other three were transferred to the burn unit at Jacobi Medical Center in critical condition, said Lata Vasconcellos, an Elmhurst Hospital spokeswoman.
Six others, including three police officers and three other civilians were taken to New York Hospital of Queens, said spokesman Paul Picard. Five of them were in stable condition, he said, but the condition of the last one was unclear.
Six firefighters were also injured in the fire. Five were being treated at New York Hospital of Queens, while one was taken to New York Weill-Cornell Burn Center The other victims were treated for non-life threatening injuries, fire officials said. The cause of the fire had not been determined by fire marshals early Wednesday. Copyright © 2004, Newsday, Inc.
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