A 7-year-old boy died and seven people were injured when a horrific fire tore through two homes in Brooklyn early this morning, fire officials said.
The 1:40 a.m. inferno reached three alarms, gutting a 3-story apartment at 1066 Decatur Street and a neighboring building in Bushwick.
The boy was identified as Joel Smith later this morning. A passerby who witnessed the blaze described how Smith was taken from the building by his father.
“There was a lot of smoke coming out of the house and then I saw a shirtless man come out of the house with his son in his arms, his son was dead,” Johnny Pache said through a translator.
“He was crying a whole bunch. He put his son in a car near-by while the ambulances showed up.”
Among the injured, one man was in critical condition while six others, some of whom were children, suffered only minor injuries.
One mom whose child was hurt said:
“We woke up and we see smoke everywhere, black smoke. So we ran. We don’t know how it started or even if it was on our floor. My son was in the ambulance. He inhaled some smoke. He’ll be fine,” said the woman, who declined to give her name.
Fire officials had not released a cause for the fire by early this morning.
After the fire was put one resident arrived home to find the charred aftermath and said: “I just got here. I live on the floor and now the third floor is gone I can’t believe it.”
Fire survivor Rose Sistrunk is overcome with emotion at the scene of the fatal fire. (Theodore Parisienne)