Williamsburg Apartment Fire Injures 9, Fire Officials Say

Photo via @NYScanner

A fire on the Monday morning after Thanksgiving weekend tore through a Williamsburg apartment building for nearly an hour and injured nine people before firefighters could extinguish the flames, according to the Fire Department of New York (FDNY).

The fire burned through the second floor of 314 South 3rd St. — directly across from the Brooklyn Arbor elementary school — from about 9:35 a.m. to about 10:30 a.m., an FDNY spokesman told Patch.

Of the nine injured in the fire, four civilians sustained minor injuries, while two civilians were injured seriously, the spokesman said. Three more firefighters were treated for minor injuries. All were expected to live.

Twenty-five units and more than 100 firefighters responded to the scene, according to the FDNY.

The FDNY could not immediately provide a cause for the fire. ”It will be under investigation by the Fire Marshall,” a spokesman said.

Elliot Pena, 33, a tenant on the building’s sixth floor, told DNAinfo: “I just saw black smoke from the hallway. ... There was no space to walk down the stairs. The smoke would’ve killed you.”

Pena and other tenants reportedly escaped the building using the fire escape.