Bronx residents gather on Prospect Avenue to pray for the lives lost during a tragic deadly fire in Belmont on Friday on December 29th, 2017. The horrific fire occurred the night before on Thursday the 28th where 12 people were killed. December 29, 2017. Edwin J. Torres/Mayoral Photography Office.
Bronx residents gather on Prospect Avenue to pray for the lives lost during a tragic deadly fire in Belmont on Friday on December 29th, 2017. The horrific fire occurred the night before on Thursday the 28th where 12 people were killed. December 29, 2017. Edwin J. Torres/Mayoral Photography Office.

 

Bronx, NY – A New York City spokesman says a building in which a fire raced through an open door and up a stairwell, killing a dozen people, was required to have self-closing doors.

Department of Housing Preservation and Development spokesman Matthew Creegan says investigators will look at why the door did not close in Thursday night’s Bronx fire.

A fire commissioner Friday said the fire started on a stove and raced through a door and up five floors. Mayor Bill de Blasio says “nothing problematic about the building … contributed to this tragedy.”

Creegan says the city takes seriously the issue of self-closing doors, required in all dwellings with more than three units. He says the city cited landlords over 7,752 times in the last year for violations of the self-closing-door requirement.

As reported by Vos Iz Neias