Child and adult killed, another child injured in house fire in Philadelphia's Fairhill neighborhood
A woman and child were killed and another child was critically injured after a fire ripped through a home in the Fairhill section of Philadelphia early Friday morning, fire officials said.
The fire broke out on the 3000 block of North 4th Street in Fairhill around 3:40 a.m.
Firefighters rescued a total of six people from the building and four were taken to hospitals: a man, woman and two children, Acting Executive Chief Daniel McCarty said at the scene.
McCarty said crews arrived at the rowhome and were met by two people trapped on the front porch behind a porch cage.
"There's the cage that's behind me, and they were able to access that," McCarty said. "It was deadbolted locked."
Inside the cage, fire officials say three people were trapped in the basement by flames.
A 45-year-old woman was taken to Temple University Hospital in extremely critical condition and later pronounced dead.
The children, a boy and a girl, were taken to St. Christopher's Hospital for Children, where the girl was pronounced dead. The boy is in extremely critical condition.
During the firefight, crews gained access to the home's basement using cutting tools and a side alleyway. McCarty said that the two children were located in the basement, where there were heavy fire and smoke conditions and a lot of stored items, making it difficult to navigate.
Officials believe a fourth person — a man who escaped from the basement — attempted to keep the children safe by moving them to the basement bathroom.
"He himself was able to get out," McCarty said, "but that was after trying to put the children in a secure location, thinking that our responders would get there by the time we there, there was so much smoke."
The cause of the fire is under investigation.
