WORLD / AMERICAS
Children among casualties of deadly NYC fire
Published: Jan 10, 2022 06:34 PM
Firefighters stand while monitoring Griffith Park, with the lights of the city below, in the aftermath of a fire in the park on Tuesday in Los Angeles, California. Tourists had to be evacuated from the 25-acre brush fire in the park. Numerous fires have sparked in Southern California from an ongoing heat wave. Photo: AFP

Firefighters stand while monitoring Griffith Park, with the lights of the city below, in the aftermath of a fire in the park on Tuesday in Los Angeles, California. Tourists had to be evacuated from the 25-acre brush fire in the park. Numerous fires have sparked in Southern California from an ongoing heat wave. Photo: AFP


Nine children were among at least 19 people killed and dozens injured when a fire tore through a high-rise apartment building in New York on Sunday in one of America's worst residential fires in recent memory.

At least 200 firefighters responded to the blaze, which broke out just before 11:00 am (16:00 GMT) on the second and third floors of a 19-story building in The Bronx.

Witnesses reported seeing trapped residents screaming for help from windows during the deadly inferno that the city's fire chief said had been caused by a portable electric heater, leaving victims on "every floor."

Mayor Eric Adams told reporters that 19 people had been confirmed dead and 63 had been injured, including several that were in a "critical condition." "This is going to be one of the worst fires in our history," he said.

"Join me in praying for those we lost, especially the 9 innocent young lives that were cut short," he added in a later tweet. The mainly working class borough of The Bronx is home to a large number of immigrants and Adams said "many" of the building's residents had been Muslims who moved to New York from Gambia.

Photographs and video posted on social media showed flames and thick black smoke billowing out of a third-story window of the brick building at East 181st Street as firefighters operated on a nearby ladder.

"The fire alarm of course started and then, everywhere was smoke," said Mohamed Trawalley, 49, a resident of the building. 

"It was chaos," George King, who lives directly adjacent to the building, told AFP.

New York City Fire Department Commissioner Daniel Nigro told reporters that the fire started in a bedroom in a portable electric heater.