Three people were found dead in a fire Saturday at an Elmhurst residential building with several illegally converted apartments, according to city officials.
Around 5:40 a.m. police received a 911 call reporting a fire at 90-31 48th Avenue near Newtown High School.
The three-alarm fire had spread to all three floors of the building by the time first responders arrived, said FDNY Chief for Fire Operations Thomas Richardson at a press conference at the scene.
Two of the bodies were found on the second floor and the other on the third floor. The fire appears to have started on the first floor, Richardson said.
FDNY could not immediately provide details on the identity, age, gender or other information of the victims.
Two civilians were injured and two firefighters were injured, including a firefighter inside the building who fell through a hole in the floor but was able to escape with minor injuries, said FDNY EMS Operations Bureau Chief Stephen Russo. They were taken to area hospitals for treatment.
The extent of the damage to the building was so severe, the roof collapsed into the top floor and another part of the second floor collapsed.
Richardson said they believe eight people lived in the building, and fire officials are still looking for two residents. The two residents may not have been home during the fire, but “we are continuing our searches to see if we can locate the other folks if they were in the building,” Richardson said.
“I grabbed what I can, boots, because I was sleeping. Knocked on several doors just to see if anybody’s here, available,” a resident told CBS-2 about his escape from the burning building. “Once I opened the door, I saw the flames shooting from the basement up. So, if it wasn’t for the basement door creating a barrier, I probably wouldn’t have made it out.”
Neighbors have said the building was occupied by homeless people, according to reports. The building was under a partial vacate order issued in February 2018 by the city Department of Buildings because the basement was rented without a permit. The DOB website shows a long list of other complaints, including one from January that reported “60 people already living” at the location, as well as a complaint in May that construction was underway on the roof without a permit. Another complaint in August 2018 said, “The entirety of this house, including the garage, has been illegally converted into several rooms for rent.”
A screenshot of some of the complaints at the address.
Another complaint as far back as 2016 reported the property "has been illegally divided into several rooms. There are three floors. However, there are now seven rooms on each floor. I placed several complaints. However, nothing has happened.”
There are also 27 open zoning or construction violations on the property, most of which were issued to Munawwara Mahmood, who has addresses in the Elmhurst building as well as a home in Jamaica Estates. Property records show the building was sold in February to two parties: an LLC named after the address, and U.S. Bank National Association in Coppell, Texas.
A request for comment to the DOB was not immediately answered Saturday. A message sent to a possible email address for Mahmood for comment was not immediately returned Saturday. The cause of the fire is to be determined by fire marshals.
Update: The Department of Buildings said Saturday the agency had issued a partial vacate order in February 2018 after finding 6 illegally converted single-room occupancy units in the cellar alone. The owner of the building racked up more than $217,000 in associated penalties after failing to address the violating conditions, said DOB spokesperson Andrew Rudansky. He noted the vacate order was still in effect.
In May, the DOB inspected the property because the owner paved over the front yard in violation of zoning code. It was not clear why the DOB did not enforce the vacate order at that time.
“Illegal Conversions pose a severe fire hazard to not only building occupants, but neighbors and first responders as well, which is why we previously issued a Vacate Order for the cellar of this building and issued punitive violations to the landlord. Our inspectors remain on scene, conducting a full investigation into this tragic fire,” Rudansky said in a statement.
Rudansky sent a followup statement about the most recent inspection: "During that May 2020 inspection, we attempted to inspect the inside of the building, but no one answered the door. We conducted an inspection of the outside of the building, and issued the one violation. We found no evidence outside of the house that the vacate order in the cellar was not being complied with."
The DOB was inspecting the building's structural stability as well as damage to neighboring buildings at 90-31A 48th Avenue and 90-29 48th Avenue.
Clarification: this article was updated to clarify the partial vacate order was issued for the units in the cellar and not the entire building.
