Killer blaze arson?

Press, 22 January 1979, Page 1

Killer blaze arson?

NZPA Hoboken, New Jersey

A fire believed to have been started deliberately raced through a five-storey apartment building in Hoboken’s waterfront district on Saturday, killing at least 18 persons and injuring 19 others in a firestorm of collapsing brick and timber, according to officials. Rescue workers used a crane to search for three missing persons before stopping for the night from their grim hunt through rubble left by the collapse of the roof and two top storeys. The search for victims lasted about 19 hours after the fire was reported early in the morning.

“It was an inferno: it was the worst fire for fatalities I have seen in my 30 years on the force,” said the deputy fire chief (Mr Francis Hunsinger). He was among the first officials to arrive at the red-brick building minutes after a police car, on a routine patrol through the low-income, mostly Hispanic neighbourhood, spotted the fire. Residents of the building, screaming in panic, jumped from windows in their night-clothes. Some tossed babies from ledges. Others hung from scalding metal fire escapes and clotheslines. “We could hear nothing

but screaming,” said Mr Hunsinger. “The building was totally engulfed: it was one huge column of flames. The first thing 1 saw was a man hanging down from a second-floor ledge pleading for help. The next thing I saw was a woman lying on the pavement, her legs totally shattered, and a man was lying a few feet away all crumpled.”

Some of the dead were found clustered in rooms: one adult couple were holding hands, two children were locked in an embrace, and the bodies of three other children were found huddled under a third-floor dining table.