Fire tears up 3 homes in Flatbush, Fire Men Injured

Click Here to watch a news cast of this event. [CBS2]
Click Here to watch a news cast of this event. [NEWS12]

Last night [Thursday] at around 8:00pm a fire broke out in a Jewish home in Flatbush, the fire started out on the second floor of the house and then broke out in the basement of the house as well then spreading to the whole house. Due to the winds and the heat of the fire the house next door also caught fire.

While fire fighters were fighting the flames in these 2 houses, another fire broke out across the street and according to fire officials, the 2 incidents did not appear to be related and both fires appear to have started due faulty electrical wiring. The incident brought over 40 fire engines and reporters from major news stations, including CBS and Brooklyn-12.

More pictures in the Extended Article, along with a report from CBS.

Serious Tragedy Miraculously Averted

This murky morning [Wednesday] at around 7:10am a fire broke out in a home on President Street between Brooklyn & New York, the family was just getting up and getting the children ready for school when smoke all of a sudden filled up the house. A call was immediately placed to 911, which sparked a quick response but when they arrived on scene they immediately called in for more backup, bringing a total of 9 fire trucks and engines.

The home which is constructed mostly of wood and sheetrock was quickly engulfed in flames, but thanks the Fire Department both parents and all 5 children were able to get out of the house unharmed! Due to the intensity of the flames, the fire fighters had to saw off the security gates and punch a big hole in the roof to gain entry to the upper levels of the house.

What caused this fire is still unclear and is being investigated.

Click Here to watch a short video clip of FDNY trying to get into the house.

More pictures in the Extended Article.

Black Smoke Over Mongomery Street

Sunday at around 3:50 the intersection of Montgomery & Albany fill up with the blearing sirens of Fire Trucks which were responding to a call for black smoke rising from the roof of the building on the corner. The FDNY came down with full force and put up 2 ladders on the roof and a group of fire fighters charged into the building through the back door, busting it down, and going in to find… a boiler!

Since this building is an older building the boiler it uses is still an old one and the superintendent of the building was turning it on for the first time that day, so this boiler coughs up some white smoke then black smoke (and if you see green don’t be surprised) and someone seeing this thought it was a fire, but B”H it was not. And B”H we have such a vigilant Fire Fighter force which was there instantly just in case it really would have been a fire.

The Matzoh Bakery’s Oven’s Have Been Turned On, Officially

The Matzah Bakery located on Albany Ave. between Montgomery St. & Empire Blvd. is adjacent to a “Kloister” and an apartment that is rented out above it. Every year they cause problems to the bakery by calling the Fire Department and other various city agencies to try and interfere with the operation of the bakery, and get it shut down.

Yesterday (Sunday) the ovens were turned on for the first time this season and caused a lot of smoke to come out of the building and not through the designated chimney alone (which is set at a good 20 feet over the building to prevent complaints from the neighbors) but out of the whole roof. So the FDNY came at around 6:00pm and checked the area out but didn’t deem it a fire and they left the scene.

But 2 hours later when the smoke started to come out of the roof once more, 2 ladder trucks and 2 pumping trucks a fire chief and a battalion chief arrived on scene, and they went in full force with ladders onto the roof and into the bakery itself with the water hoses. After this second time that the fire department came, they deemed the smoke problem due to an imbalance of wood and gas but once the oven was alight the problem had been corrected. The neighbor asked the fire chief if the oven was a legal oven and if it was operating legally, to which he replied “yes ma’am”. Now we begin to prepare for Pesach. (yeh right!)

More Pictures in the Extended Article

FDNY Shuts [Torah] Tots Center

A Staten Island day-care center was shut down yesterday when firefighters — after reading about its grand-opening celebrations in a local paper — paid a surprise inspection and found it was unlicensed.

The Torah Tots Academy, which was run by the Jewish sect Chabad Lubavitch, had about 80 kids from 2 to 5 years old enrolled, authorities said.

The site of the day-care center — which was run out of two neighboring houses, at 289 Harold St. and 389 Bradley Ave., and a trailer — was also home to Yeshiva Mesivta Menachem and a synagogue.

FDNY brass had initially inspected the site weeks ago.

3 Boys Die in Fire Caused by Stove Left on for Pesach

Fire caused by stovetop burners left on for Pesach killed three boys as it whipped through a Brooklyn apartment at 5:30am, a few hours after the family had gone to bed at the end of their Seder.

Ten other people were injured in the fire and were treated by Hatzoloh and Shomrim, including two sisters who jumped out a second-story window and three firefighters. The boys who died were two brothers, Shyia and Yidal Matyas, 15 and 13, and their 7-year-old nephew, Shlomi Falkowitz.

A fire official said that the Halacha of leaving a flame burning during Shabbos and Yom tov has caused 35 kitchen fires at Bedford Gardens, the 600-unit apartment complex in Williamsburg, in the last several months.

false alarm for FDNY

At 3:01am a call came through to the FDNY where a tenant at 1325 Union Street thought he smelt gas, and by 3:07am there were 7 fire trucks on the scene tehy went in to check everything out and it turned out it was nothing, at 3:14am the fire trucks left the scene and PD remained to speak to the tenant and arrested him at 3:18am.

Fire in Kingston Ave Station

Early Friday morning there was a call to the Fire Department notifying them of a fire on the train tracks in the Kingston Ave. station in front of 770. All together there were 6 trucks responding to the call. However B”H there was no major damage, and the fire was put out immediately.

Four Children Die In Overnight NJ Fire

TEANECK, NJ (CBS) Tragedy in Teaneck, New Jersey, as four children die in an overnight fire.

Hours after firefighters responding to a report of smoke could find nothing wrong, a house erupted in flames early Tuesday morning, killing four children and critically injuring their mother.

Two other children, girls ages 14 and 7, were rescued by a neighbor who propped a ladder against the burning home. The children were being checked at a hospital.

The dead children, whose names were not immediately released, were boys ages 15, 6 and 4, and a 5-year-old girl, police Lt. Norman Levine said.

Fire Chief John Bauer said the fire department got a call from the house at 8:30 p.m. Monday reporting smoke in the basement of three-story brick Tudor.

“On our arrival, there was no smoke. We spent over a half-hour checking the house. We couldn’t find anything wrong with the house. We checked all the electrical devices,” Bauer said.

Fire On New York Ave. and Union St.

At 9:30pm last night there was a fire on the corner of Union and New York.

Most of the building’s inhabitants are black, but there are a few jewish family’s that live there as well.

This building was recently purchased by a jewish business man and this is the second fire since he has purchased it.

The last fire was blamed on a faulty extension cable that heated up and caught fire, destroying 3 apartments on the fourth floor and causing some heavy exterior damage to the roof and roof gutters.

Last night’s fire was on the third floor and was relatively small and caused very little damage thanks to extremely fast fire department response which were there in minutes and had subdued the fire in minutes

3 fire companies had come to the scene, a total of 6 fire engines, 3 ladders and 3 pumping trucks and there were 6 fire chiefs on site as well!

There were no reported injuries.

More pictures in the extended article.