Saturday, January 12, 2008

Site of LI home fire had no C of O

A West Hempstead man who rescued his family from a raging house fire Friday now faces questions of why they were living in the home without the proper occupancy permits, town officials said.

House in hero-dad blaze lacked permits

Dr. Herman Weiss, 37, safely pulled his six children and his wife out of their home around 3 a.m. Friday, after he awoke to the blaring sound of a smoke detector and saw flames licking up the western exterior wall of their two-story house on Maple Street.

"This could have been a real tragedy," Weiss said Friday afternoon as he stood outside the burnt remnants of the home, which he built in 2006 to accomodate his growing family.

The fire began on the outside of the house, near a vent opening for the home's water heater, and is not considered suspicious, said Vincent McManus, division supervisor for the Nassau County fire marshal's office.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Think CO are not important nor the accuracy and adherence to code on the CO itself is minor? Well folks your neighbor or his bought architect can bring your house down along with his because of a faulty CO or none at all!!! Don't let unauthorised or fraudulant demo, renovation or alteration get sweeped under the carpet - do something about it, call 311 or 911.

Anonymous said...

Oh....there are soooo many occupied buildings in NY without a C of O. Nothing new.

Anonymous said...

The ones built before 1935 don't need one. But if there were alterations, they would need one. Of course, the way the DOB is here, people get away with a lot.