Three people died in a Queens fire that tore through a house full of shoddy converted apartments early Sunday — with panicked survivors leaping out of windows to escape the flames, FDNY officials said.
The blaze broke out on Chevy Chase St. near Henley Road in Jamaica Estates about 1:30 a.m., officials said, with the inferno soon bursting through the windows and roof.
FDNY officials described the house as a fire trap, with no apparent smoke detectors, makeshift walls and occupants packed into apartments on the first and second floor as well as the cellar and attic.
Firefighters found three people dead at the scene, including a 67-year-old man, according to police.
“There’s no evidence to us at this time that there’s a working smoke detector in this house,” FDNY Commissioner Robert Tucker told reporters at the scene. “And there’s a lot of evidence of extension cords and other carelessness.”
At least five residents were hurt but survived, including three injured jumping out of second-floor and attic windows, according to police sources. One of the five survivors is in critical condition, according to FDNY officials.
FDNY Chief of Department John Esposito described the scene inside the house.
“When our units arrived, they had fire out the windows of the first floor. The fire had extended to the second floor and attic and these were all living spaces,” he said. “There were makeshift walls. The means of egress were substandard, exits blocked, stairways blocked.”
“There was a wall through the middle of the kitchen, which was very abnormal,” he added. “There’s makeshift access to the second floor, which allows the fire to spread much quicker upstairs.”
Four firefighters suffered minor injuries in the blaze, which the FDNY brought under control by about 3 a.m.
The house is listed in city records as a single-family home but dozens of Buildings Compartment complaints dating as far back as 2008 show neighbors and residents complaining that it was illegally converted into a rooming house.
The most recent complaint, from February 2023, reads, “The home owner (has) a mental disabled individual living in the basement. The home owner built a half wall in the kitchen so someone can live there…. there is approximately 12 to 14 people in the house.”
A resident, Adham Ammar, 29, said he’s lived in the house for the past seven years despite the warning signs.
“(The landlord) was not maintaining the place very well and I saw many red flags in the safety of the place but it was hard to find something else for the same price,” he said.
Ammar was hanging out with friends before returning home around 5 a.m. to the burnt-out house and saw one of the victims who died in a “black bag covered (with) a white cloth.”
The cause of the blaze is under investigation.
With Theodore Parisienne
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