Metro

News of husband’s death awaits Strand fire survivor

A man critically injured escaping a high-rise fire in Hell’s Kitchen still doesn’t know his husband and their dogs died in the blaze, a friend said Monday.

Michael Cohen, 32, has been in New York Hospital’s burn unit under sedation and on a ventilator since the Jan. 5 inferno on West 43rd Street that killed his husband, playwright Daniel McClung, 27.

“It’s a matter of seeing how well enough he is to handle the news that his partner died and his dogs died, because he doesn’t know,” the friend said.

The tragedy has prompted an outpouring of support, with an online fund-raiser collecting more than 1,600 donations for Cohen’s medical expenses.

It has also stirred a push for new fire-safety rules.

City Councilman Corey Johnson proposed Monday to require residential buildings with more than six floors to install emergency public-address systems in stairwells and make fire drills mandatory.

“I think fire drills should be part of” the legislation, said Johnson, whose district includes Hell’s Kitchen. “It’s something I plan on including.”

He called PA systems a “common-sense, easy solution” that could have alerted McClung and Cohen to stay in their apartment instead of fleeing down a stairwell that firefighters were using to vent smoke.