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The cause of the five-alarm fire? A "malfunctioning electric space heater” in a bedroom of a duplex apartment on the second and third floors of the 19-story building, NYFD Commissioner Daniel Nigro said.
A door to the apartment was left open, filling the building with smoke, Nigro told reporters.
All of the children killed were 16 years old and younger, according to Stefan Ringel, a senior adviser to Mayor Eric Adams. Nearly three dozen more were hospitalized in critical condition.
Heroic city firefighters battled the smoke and flames for an untold number of high-risk rescues.
At least 200 firefighters responded to the 120-unit Twin Parks North West complex on East 181 Street after the blaze broke out on the upper floor of the duplex apartment around 11 a.m.
The smoke eaters “found victims on every floor and were taking them out in cardiac and respiratory arrest” in the city's worst fire in more than three decades, Nigro told reporters. "Some of them were already in arrest when we reached them.
“That is unprecedented in our city.”
Photos from the scene showed firefighters on aerial ladders giving babies and other limp children oxygen after carrying them out windows.
Nineteen people had minor injuries and were treated at the scene, according to the FDNY. All of those hospitalized and treated without transport suffered at the very least from severe smoke inhalation, authorities said.
“What I do know, and we’ve stressed this over and over, the door to that apartment was left open causing the fire to spread and the smoke to spread,” Nigro said.
Although an investigation was underway, authorities said they didn't consider the cause suspicious.
“There’s no guarantee that there’s a working fire alarm in every apartment, or in every common area,” U.S. Rep. Ritchie Torres told The Associated Press. “Most of these buildings have no sprinkler system."
The last fire of this magnitude in New York City was an arson blaze that killed 87 people at the Happy Land social club, also in the Bronx, in 1990.
Sunday's fire was " a tragedy beyond measure," Mayor Adams said."The impact of this fire is going to really bring a level of just pain and despair in our city," he told reporters.
"The numbers are horrific," the mayor added after the blaze was brought under control shortly before 1:30 p.m. "We have over 32 people who are life-threatening at this time.”
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