by JOHN ELIGON and ANN FARMER
hree people died and five others were injured, two critically, when a fire ripped through a three-story brick building in Queens on Sunday morning and forced people to jump from their windows, police and fire officials said.
Six firefighters received minor injuries in the blaze, at the corner of 69th Street and Metropolitan Avenue in Middle Village. The fire, contained to two apartments of the building, was being investigated as suspicious, the authorities said.
The authorities identified the people killed as Heriberto Garcia-Vera, 68, his wife, Flor Sandoval, 48, and his son, Felipe Garcia, 20. It was unclear whether Mr. Garcia-Vera died inside the burning building or from jumping out. The blaze appeared to have started in the stairwell of the building, which housed Z Star Deli Grocery on the ground floor and apartment units on the next two floors, the fire department said. But the cause of the blaze was still under investigation, according to the Fire Department.
George Zugajewicz, who works as a security guard at an auto shop across the street from the deli, went in for a bite to eat near the end of his overnight shift.
As the store owner, Mohammad al-Matari, prepared him a toasted bagel with butter shortly after 7 a.m., Mr. Zugajewicz said, he saw something that seemed more like a scene from a movie than real life: A man and a woman engulfed in flames frantically stumbled into the store.
With little time to comprehend the horrifying scene, Mr. Zugajewicz grabbed gallons of spring water and passed them to Mr. al-Matari, who led the burning people outside and doused them with water.
The woman "curled up like a ball," Mr. Zugajewicz said. "I pushed her down and put the flames out on her chest with my hands."
Shortly before that, Mr. Zugajewicz said, he heard commotion coming from the floor above. He said it sounded as if people were falling down stairs. The deli was shaking, he said, and things fell off the shelves. But it was only when the flame-covered man and woman ran in that he realized there was a fire.
Mr. Zugajewicz, 43, said the man was screaming: "Help me! Help me! Get the fire out."
After helping to extinguish the flames, Mr. Zugajewicz said, he heard glass breaking from around the side of the building, which is adjacent to a parking lot. Around the corner he found a man screaming for help from a window. So he rolled a small trash bin beneath the window, and the man jumped into it, his injuries limited to a few scratches, Mr. Zugajewicz said.
Then, back in front of the deli, Mr. Zugajewicz said, he saw a man lowering a woman out of a third-floor window onto a commercial sign attached just below the second floor window, where she awaited help. Before the firefighters could bring a ladder to her, the man jumped out of the window, and they both fell to the sidewalk, Mr. Zugajewicz said.
"I heard a cracking noise and saw blood coming out of her head," he said. "It was just a frightening, horrible thing to see."
While the authorities still had not determined what caused the fire, residents said the power went in and out during Saturday night's storm. When the building did have power, lights were dim and air-conditioners barely worked, residents said.
Orlando Merced, 48, who lives with his family in the building, said he was awakened Sunday morning by the constant ringing of his intercom.
"I heard a lot of screaming, a lot of chaos," he said. "I thought it was a fight."
But then, he and his wife smelled smoke, he said. He said his daughter's bedroom was filled with smoke, so he grabbed his wife and two children, and they left their apartment.
When he got outside, he said: "I saw two people sprawled on the floor. That was about it."
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