Buffalo firefighters save six. Listen to the dramatic fireground audio and the interviews with the firefighters.
Listen to fireground audio from Erie County Fire Wire
Click here for early video and pictures from Erie County Fire Blotter and more pictures here
Article by Marie Sisti at WGRZ-TV:
A three-year-old girl is in Women and Children’s Hospital and two adults are in critical condition at ECMC, following a fire that swept through their East Side home Sunday morning.
No word yet on what started the early morning fire Sunday at 96 Crossman Avenue near the Buffalo/Cheektowaga border.
The condition of 3-year-old Martejha Drayton is not known. 37-year-old Eugene Barker and 43-year-old Cherie Chatmon are being treated in the Burn Unit at ECMC. The three other children who were trapped in the home were treated and released from the hospital.
The call came in at 6:42 Sunday morning for a fire on Crossman Avenue in Buffalo with people trapped inside.
“I was driving, took a quick look at the address and off we went. As soon as we turned the corner, we saw smoke the lieutenant called smoke showing,” said Firefighter Pat Lalley.
As soon as firefighters from Engine 31 and Ladder 14 arrived, they split up, some working on knocking down the fire, the others looking for those trapped inside.
“As we were down looking for a way into the house, we heard kids screaming in the backyard, we both ran back there, we found one girl on top of an SUV and she was yelling that her brothers were still upstairs,” said Lt. Doug Lash.
“The kitchen door was burning through, I forced that door and firefighter O’Leary started putting the fire out,” said Lt. Dan O’Leary.
“We got water on the fire and started knocking it down,” said firefighter Tom O’Leary.
“The one boy was hanging. Hanging by his hands on broken windows no less. We coaxed him, finally got him to drop, I caught him, set him down and then his brother came out, he was taking a beating from the smoke. We got him out and he was hanging,” said Lt. Doug Lash.
“We just kept screaming at them, ‘drop we’ll catch you, we’ll catch you’ and finally they believed us.”
Meanwhile, Lt. O’Leary began searching the back of the first floor of the house.
“In the right hand side I looked and firefighter Jerry Norstram was coming through an outside window and said ‘I found one’ and I assisted firefighter Norstram in assisting one of the victims out of the window.”
Upstairs, two firefighters were searching for the the fourth child, a three year old girl.
“We’re on our hands and knees and pretty much just feeling for anything- mattresses, other furniture,” said firefighter Quincy Drake.
“It was heavy smoke from top to bottom you couldn’t see your hand in front of your face. When we got to the front we found the last victim and we just scooped her up and took her outside.”
“There was a total team effort by everybody without everybody none of this would have got done it was a great job.” said Lt. O’Leary.
