The fire broke out at a two-family home on 182nd Street around 9 a.m.
The fire started in a bedroom in the middle of the first floor apartment. When an eight year-old boy realized his baby brother was still inside, he ran back in and both became trapped.
Firefighters performed cpr on the sidewalk after risking their own lives to rescue them. They rushed them to the hospital, but it was all too late.
Two adults and three other children escaped with just minor injuries.
Another parent and her 18-month old baby were sleeping in the second-floor apartment, and they narrowly escaped after smoke came billowing up through the floorboards.
"She was sleeping withy my grandson, and she smelled smoke," grandmother Annette Irving said. "And all of the sudden, smoke came up from out of the floor. So she had to snatch him and run down the stairs. And I know that they had maybe six kids, and there were some kids that were in the house as well. The house is destroyed. They lost everything."
Fire Marshals spent the day sifting the ashes to determine the cause of the fire. The firefighters were on the scene in just three minutes, and they left this afternoon struggling to come to grips with the tragedy that happened here.