Dozens displaced after deadly explosion and 5-alarm fire rips through Bronx apartment building
NORWOOD, Bronx (WABC) -- Over 40 people remain unable to return home on Thursday after a deadly explosion and five-alarm fire tore through an apartment building in the Norwood section of the Bronx.
One person was killed and 14 others were injured in the blaze, according to officials.
The Red Cross said the fire displaced 45 people, including seven children, from 18 households and 27 apartments in the building, and have temporarily relocated many of them to nearby hotel.
Contractors were taking steps Thursday night to get the building stable enough for tenants to salvage what they can.
The fire was first reported on the building's second floor shortly after noon Wednesday. It reached five alarms just before 2 p.m. and was brought under control shortly after 8 p.m.
Residents told Eyewitness News they smelled gas before an explosion rocked the building, sending flames racing through the structure.
Officials said there were collapses on the building's second and third floors. Search and rescue teams later found a man, believed to be in his 40s, dead on the collapsed third floor. Authorities haven't yet identified the victim.
Fourteen people were hurt, including eight civilians and six firefighters. The two most seriously injured people, the only ones still in the hospital on Thursday night, are now in stable condition.
Among those critically injured was a 48-year-old woman who lived in the second-floor apartment where the fire is believed to have started. Officials also said one of those injured was a child younger than 1 years old, whose injuries were believed to be minor.
A resident who grew up across the street from the building said she is still rattled by the feeling of the blast shaking the block as it blew out windows and doors, and then seeing a neighbor badly hurt as the building went up in flames.
"She was really burned from head to toe. Her face was burnt. Her shirt was bad. She's in a hospital now," Abeliz Morales said.
She says the people she knew in the building complained of gas odors.
Eyewitness News spoke with the building manager by phone Thursday night who pointed to city records saying there were no recent complaints, and the building's gas lines had passed inspections as recently as a couple of months ago.
Jesus Fernandez remembers his wife reporting a gas odor a year ago.
"Maybe a little longer, but that doesn't mean the gas issues were resolved, because there's always been complaints of gas odors here," said Jesus Fernandez, who lived in the building.
He says building management cut corners with things like mold complaints and said that they never really treated the source.
"They'll come and clean it and wash and paint over the mold and keep it moving," he said. "That's the result. That's what we get. Putting a band-aid on these gas leaks and that's what happens."
Con Edison shut off gas service to the building after the explosion.
The city's Department of Buildings must determine whether the structure is safe before residents are allowed to return home.
The cause of the explosion and fire remains under investigation.
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