Elizabeth Fire: 4 Killed Were Furniture Shopping, Thousands Raised For Grieving Mom

The community is coming together in support of an Elizabeth mom critically injured in a Monday night fire that killed two of her daughters, their young friend an adult female.

Merlin Vazquez was reportedly furniture shopping with her daughters, Daniela Marquez, 8, and Paola Marquez, 10, when the fire broke out Monday.
Photo Credit: *GoFundMe*

Elizabeth fire, Oct. 5
Photo Credit: *Friends of Elizabeth NJ EMS locals 87 & 309*

At the scene
Photo Credit: *dts_jayy_ Instagram user*

Cecilia Levine

10/06/2020 4:18 p.m.

More than $11,425 had been raised on the GoFundMe for Merlin Vazquez as of Tuesday afternoon.

Vazquez, 36, was furniture shopping on the second floor of 871 Elizabeth Ave., when the fire broke out in a soda machine in the dollar store downstairs around 6 p.m., ABC7 reports.

Victims tried getting out of the back door of the second floor, but were trapped due to a locked gate, a city spokeswoman said.

Vazquez's daughter Daniela Marquez, 8, and her friend Elizabeth Correas, 11, were killed that night. Tuesday morning, the bodies of Paola Marquez, 10 -- Vazquez's other daughter -- and Candida Candida Martinez-Del Reyes, 41, were found in the rubble, ABC7 says.

Vazquez was "fighting for her life" at Trinitas Regional Medical Center, according to the GoFundMe, launched by Sherley Figueroa.

The fire reached five alarms in less than an hour, and was declared under control at 9:25 p.m.

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