A Queens family’s home was gutted by a devastating Christmas Day fire that spread from a trash can in the alleyway and engulfed the side of their house.
The FDNY responded to the three-alarm fire on 147th Street in Flushing around 3:15 p.m. Thursday, the department wrote in a post on X.
A staggering 192 firefighters and EMS personnel rushed to the harrowing scene — all within four minutes, according to the FDNY.
The right side of one home was swallowed up by flames, but the residents managed to escape unscathed, the FDNY said. Multiple windows were blown out, and what appeared to be a cushion lay flat on one roof.
By the time the fire was put out around 4:30 p.m., the right side of the house was charred beyond recognition, and some deck boards had burned to the point where they shriveled up.
A string of Christmas lights decorating the front of the residence was left untouched. A deflated lawn decoration of Santa Claus and a reindeer lay limp on the grass.
FDNY Deputy Assistant Chief Joseph Schiralli said that the inferno likely “started in a trash can in the alleyway and went up the siding” before striking the house.
One witness named Farhan said that she saw many of the “screaming” family members narrowly escape from the destroyed house, including a sick man who “couldn’t move” very well.
“Everyone was saved,” she said.
“They were crying a lot, the girls especially,” she added.
She said that the residents in the neighboring home also dashed out once the fire spread.
“It was a lot, a lot of smoke coming out,” she said.
The owner of a neighboring home that sustained minor damage told The Post that their abode was spared through sheer luck.
“It’s all about which way the wind is blowing. I feel sorry for that family, though. Unbelievable that this should happen to them on Christmas,” they said.
A separate two-alarm fire on Sutter Avenue in East New York, Brookly,n tore through a Chinese restaurant around 3:30 p.m. Thursday afternoon.
The owner of the restaurant told News 12 Brooklyn that he and his staff were taking a lunch break when they heard “a big boom.”
All of the staff escaped safely, and there were no customers dining at the time, he said.
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