JUST ASHES: One victim frantically tried to cling to this window ledge before letting go. (Theodore Parisienne)
A Brooklyn man is fighting for his life after desperately clinging to a fifth-floor window ledge to escape a blaze and then falling — but there was a small miracle amid the tragedy, authorities said yesterday.
While the raging morning fire at 23 Cook St. in Bushwick also claimed the life of the man’s roommate’s pit bull, the roomie’s other dog, Malcolm, was plucked by firefighters from underneath debris inside the apartment — alive.
The blaze broke out at 10:40 a.m., said a spokesman for the FDNY.
A neighbor said she heard a man screaming and saw him dangling from the window.
“He was hanging on to the windowsill with both hands,” said Marylyn Rodrigo, 17. “I told him to hold on, but it was too late.”
The unidentified man, believed to be in his 30s, plummeted to the courtyard.
He was rushed to Woodhull Hospital in critical condition, the FDNY said.