A three-year-old child playing with a stove burner started a fire in a Bronx, New York, apartment building on December 28 that killed 12 people and left four others critically injured, the New York Fire Department’s commissioner said on December 29.
Commissioner Daniel Nigro told reporters the child had a history of playing with the stove and started the fire without his mother’s knowledge. When the woman discovered the fire, she fled her apartment with her two children and left the door open, Nigro said.
The apartment building’s stairwell functioned like a chimney, he said, leaving those above with little time to escape.
Four children were among the 12 people who have died in the fire. Credit: FDNY via Storyful
