Two hundred firefighters are battling a fire that has grown into a five-alarm blaze in the Rosebank section of Staten Island. At this point, 34 people have been injured, 23 of them firefighters.
The fire broke out around 1 a.m., in a townhouse at 205 Chestnut Avenue. The fire spread to neighboring buildings. Residents frantically fled the structures, and a father was trapped with his two children. Anthony DiSimone, who said he saw the fire in the back of one of the houses and called 911, told the Staten Island Advance that he and his fiancee walked over, "The father was stuck up there, dangling his son outside...he couldn't do anything — black smoke was just billowing out that window. So I went underneath — he threw him right to me and I caught his son... I yelled out to him, 'just throw them out, just throw them out.'"
DiSimone caught the boy, who seems to be around 5 years old, while his fiancee caught a girl who seems to be around 3 years old.
Firefighters also rushed into the buildings to rescue residents. The FDNY's Eric Bischoff told WABC 7:
"It was an extraordinary rescue that occurred here tonight. Upon arrival, firefighters had seen that two small children were already thrown from the window. Looking at the second-floor window, heavy fire was blowing out of the window, and two civilians were trapped, screaming, behind window bars. The quick actions of the firefighters made the difference between life and death. Three of the firefighters from Ladder 81 had to send in the aerial ladder and broke the window bars. By that time, the two civilians were already overcome and passed out by smoke. They entered the raging inferno an extricated those victims, who I am told have survived.
All told, the FDNY rescued 11 residents, including six children. The injured civilians and firefighters suffered minor injuries.
