Friday, December 29, 2017
12 die in Bronx building with history of bad smoke detectors
From the Daily News:
A raging fire quickly swept through the five story building on Prospect Ave. at E. 187th St. — taking with it 12 lives — including a one-year-old child.
More than 160 firefighters responded to the five-alarm blaze near the Bronx Zoo. The inferno broke out at 6:51 p.m. on the first floor and quickly spread upward. Firefighters responded in three minutes, after receiving more than a dozen 911 calls.
The cause of the fire was not immediately clear. Sources said the blaze may have been sparked by a space heater, but de Blasio said was too early in the investigation to tell.
A database in the New York City Housing Preservation and Development revealed one of the apartments on the first floor — where the fire started — had open violations for bad carbon monoxide and smoke detectors.
Attempts to reach the building owners were unsuccessful.
25 comments:
The Bronx is burning, again. This is the 3rd apartment building that has went up in flames in the borough in the past few months,2 during the holidays.
This was a real affordable housing building that went up in flames. Witnesses and early morning reports are saying that the fire shot up the building in minutes. Like if it was doused in kerosene.
The mayor's statements were stilted and insincere and now more families are homeless because of the criminal indifference of the building's owners and the D.O.B..
I wonder if this building was inspected by the guy from D.O.B. who just lost his job for his own illegal conversions?
This cesspool needs to be drained.
Nicely put LLC.
FIRST OF ALL THIS IS A FUCKING TRAGEDY AND WE SHOULD BE MORE SYMPATHETIC. WITH THAT SAID, IT WILL HAPPEN AGAIN AND AGAIN. IF THE CITY DOESN'T CRACK DOWN ON ILLEGAL HOME CONVERSIONS IN RESIDENTIAL HOMES THROUGHOUT THE CITY THIS WILL BECOME A COMMON OCCURENCE AND WE WILL ALL BECOME NUMB TO THE NEWS OF ANOTHER FIRE TRAGEDY.
the latest update was the child was playing with the burners on the stove this is how it happened and once the fire started they all ran out of the apartment and did not close the door and that is how the fire traveled up the stairwells - very sad for all - but where was the mother
Many killed in a fire from a toddler playing with a stove in the middle of the night?
The names of victims unknown at this time?
Sounds like a news flash from the 3rd world.
Sure I realize it may be better than their country, but people should never be taken in this country unless we can guarantee a quality of life that they are not endangered or exploited. To do so goes against every bed-rock principle of this nation.
We should limit immigration until we can to this.
a tragic and avoidable shame. well said llc.
This child had a history of playing with the burners" why would you leave that child in the kitchen alone? This is a very sad situation for sure
Always a laugh reading some of these comments. If your hammer in life is immigration you'll turn any story into your nail.
I trust the fire department. If they say the cause was a kid playing with gas and shitty smoke detector building violations, then that's what happened here. If you don't have actual proof otherwise, you're just making up fake news.
Yes this is a tragedy, derived from stupidity and neglect. Not on the toddler, but on the parent or parents. The sick irony is that 12 people are dead not because of the landlords negligence because the fire alarms weren't working, but of the parents negligence for leaving a baby unsupervised that the kid would be so bored to think the oven was a toy
Just a horrible accident. Condolences to all that perished, their relatives and all those that are now without a home in this unfair city.
I stand by my critique of the mayor.
I was wrong about it being a toddler, it was ignited by a 3 year old kid. What made him think the oven was a toy?
Lots of penis stroking in this thread.
While it may be popular to blame the mother, the fact is that the building was required to have self closing fire rated doors and that appears to not be the case.
HPD needs to put staff to work checking their records for smoke and carbon monoxide detector complaints and violations and they must mandate corrections immediately.
QC:
Sorry for not mentioning the stupid door that didn't shut. That's another thing overlooked in this tragedy because of the child's mistake. Hopefully, the owners won't avoid any penalties for this violation, which clearly accelerated the blaze.
Also overlooked: there was a military veteran that got killed trying to save other tenants. he went back a third time and didn't make it. And the only hydrant in the area was frozen so the FDNY couldn't douse it out quick enough. Just horrible circumstances all around
Penis stroking?
Check this out from the recent post
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/child-playing-stove-ignited-bronx-fire-killed-12-people-article-1.3725603
Mayor de Blasio, on his weekly Friday radio show, described the Christmas week carnage as “a horrible, tragic accident” while absolving the building’s landlord of any role in the nightmare.
ANY ROLE.
Not including the lack of a self-closing fire door that you mentioned nor the criminal lack of working smoke detectors.
Still don't know the name of the landlord or owners either, guess anyone has to search for it themselves. Good job Tronc/Daily News.
And to the anon about penis stroking about this tragedy. Here's some stroking from the grandmother of the baby that perished:
The paternal grandmother of infant victim Amora Serenity Vidal was outraged that the little boy’s mom left him unattended in the kitchen despite a history of such behavior.
“She should have been watching her kid,” said Nyvia Vidal, 47, of the Bronx. “I’m an angry grandmother. This is all her fault. You have to watch your children. This didn’t have to happen.”
Nigro said the youngster “had a history of playing with the burners and turning them on. Before the mother knew it, this fire had gotten a good hold in the kitchen ... A lot of fire, a lot of smoke.”
Stand pat on the criticism of the mother. Unless you were from a hut somewhere in a jungle or cinder block room in the in bush, there is absolutely no excuse for her to let a 3 year old play with a stove at that hour, then panic like that leaving the door open.
It seems that the finer points of civilization, like 2000 years of common sense, were things she never acquired.
She should be arrested and convicted of manslaughter, but, being a black immigrant, people will get racist on this saying she 'did not know better', implying she was an irresponsible adult-child, and find someone else to blame: the city inspectors, the landlord, society in general. That is just not right.
Every person should be equally held responsible no matter their skin color or their background.
"WE SHOULD BE MORE SYMPATHETIC"
Why?
Darwinism in action? Unfortunately when people have to live in close proximity to each other, you pay for other idiots' mistakes. Glad I'm fortunate enough to live in a detached home with no idiot neighbors.
I will say this: one of the largest home-owning groups of first and second-generation immigrants in Queens is "from the Jungle", including myself. I've been to that Jungle, and others besides. An illiterate woman I sat down to share dinner with in a hut, on top of a mountain in Vietnam, with only an earthen floor, who had built her own home, including a gas stove, and had two bright kids playing nearby, has far, far more wisdom than many people in NYC, and would not have let this happen.
People get used to the government or some authority figure taking care of and providing everything for them, coupled with poor education, leads to a severe lack of common sense, in general. That applies in Hick county in the South, in Appalachia, and certainly here.
The building has long been owned by a company called D & A Equities. “We are shocked and saddened at the loss of life and injuries which occurred,” the company said in a statement. “Our prayers and thoughts are with the families affected.”
The company has owned more than two dozen buildings, and at other properties close by, tenants described the landlord as mostly responsible and responsive. “They answer when you call,” said Maribel Aquino, a receptionist who has lived for nine years in a building a short walk from Prospect Avenue.
Letting a child play with a gas stove- criminal negligence. Where is the father? Arrest him, 12 people died. Deport the mother and all family members - they don't deserve to be in this country- after they serve long prison sentences for criminal negligence and homicide.
Typical - illegal alien causes deaths and property destruction and we are all supposed to have sympathy. Maybe the ones that should get the sympathy are the American taxpayers who paid for these children to be born and support them as Daddy ran away.
They will say it's racism to not let your child play with the burners on a gas stove. They will say it's racism to expect the mother to have some kind of parenting skills. Was she a crack head, junkie or something?
I wonder if Child Protective Services ever came into her home before this fire.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5221959/Bronx-apartment-building-owner-hundreds-complaints.html
If you can deal with the excessive amount of ads and clickbait headline, the daily mail has more on the owner and management. It's not that pretty. For if this fire wasn't started by a child with a stupid neglectful selfish mother, D & A and their own neglect to provide working fire alarms would get warranted attention.
From the article, which includes posted D.O.B. inspections and a graph of all properties and total violations and registered complaints:
According to NY Department of Buildings records, one property, 185 McClellan Street, had 45 complaints from residents, the majority of which relate to elevators being out of service for several weeks and continually breaking down.
In December 2013, one complaint reads: 'Door leading to fire escape has a deadbolt that is locke[d].' This complaint was later resolved.
Other complaints related to illegal conversions of apartments and dangerous construction conditions.
Another property, 1181 Sheridan Avenue, had 16 complaints between 2005 and 2016, a number of which were related to out-of-service elevators and falling debris.
In September 2015, a resident complained about exposed wires from a large electrical box placed on a thin wall and claimed the work had been done by an unlicensed contractor.
This is horrible. It didn't have to happen. It wasn't a space heater or candle that tipped over. It wasn't faulty wiring neglected by the building. You have to lay the blame squarely at the feet of the mother. People feel a need to spread the blame around because, hey, kids will be kids, right?
Are they illegal aliens? I didn't see that anywhere.
Middle of the night? It was 6:30 pm.
Lots of false info and hate in these comments.
She should have alerted her neighbors, that is a given.
One more dead from injuries sustained in the fire. 13 dead.
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