Hero teen saves residents from deadly apartment fire
theGrio REPORT - Monday, a 16-year-old boy rushed into a burning Brooklyn apartment building to help save several residents from the deadly fire.
Monday, a 16-year-old boy rushed into a burning Brooklyn apartment building to help save several residents from a deadly fire.
“I seen smoke in the building window and I just sprung. I ran upstairs trying to help save another lady that was still in there,” Taliq Thomas wrote on Facebook after the 1:45 a.m. fire burned through the Flatbush residence, killing a dad of three and injuring five others.
Thomas told NewYork’s Pix11 he was walking home from a friend’s house when he spotted the flames on Nostrand Ave. That’s when he helped drag a mattress under a window so that two men trapped inside could try to jump to safety.
Witnesess says one of the men survived by landing on top of the awning of the Golden Krust Caribbean restaurant below.
“I don’t have any choice. I have to jump,” said Jean Maurice, to NBC’s Channel 4. The other man, 58-year-old Tony Celestin, landed on the bedding below but later died at the hospital.
Thomas told Channel 11 that after helping to drag the mattress over, he ran inside the building and began knocking on doors trying to help people get out.
He shared on Facebook,
[One] guy who jumped out a window told us 3people was in there .. It Got way to hot after 2minutes .. so I couldn’t do anything!!!!
IM REALLY UPSET AT MYSELF.. ANOTHER GUY FELL OUT THE WINDOW RIGHT INFRONT OF ME… AND I COULDN’T DO ANYTHING … I FELT HELPLES AND SOO SAD…MY HEART FEELS SO HEAVY.. … that was Very sad ..
Thanks be to God and the firefighters Not alowing me not go in any further .. I could lost my life trying to save somone else.
Brooklyn Councilman Jumaane Williams praised Thomas.
“His heroic actions quite possibly saved lives,” Williams said in a statement.
