West Baltimore Fire: 2 Children Dead, 1 Adult Injured In Burnt Home

Two young children died and a woman suffered injuries Friday in a house fire in Baltimore, Maryland. The fire was on the second floor of a three-story house in the 1100 block, N. Mount Street near Riggs Avenue in the west Baltimore neighborhood of Sandtown-Winchester, the Baltimore Sun reported.

The Baltimore City Fire Department responded to the fire around 7:30 p.m. EST and found heavy flames and smoke emanating from the second story of the building. The blaze was brought under control within about an hour, said fire department officials. No firefighters were injured during the operation.

According to Blair Skinner, a spokeswoman for the department, the children — a 1-year-old boy and a 2-year-old girl — were in cardiac arrest when firefighters spotted them inside the house. They were rushed to a nearby hospital where they were pronounced dead, Skinner said.

The team also rescued a woman, believed to be the children’s aunt, who was taken to the same hospital with non-life threatening injuries. None of the three victims were identified by officials at the time of writing this story.

Fire officials said a total of five people lived in the home, but only three were inside when the accident happened. Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh and Baltimore police commissioner Darryl DeSousa arrived on the scene and spoke to the fire officials soon after.

The cause of the fire was not yet known and further investigation was going on. Skinner said the team did not know if there were working fire detectors in the house. The state medical examiner will determine the cause of the kid’s deaths, Skinner added.

“Our thoughts and prayers go out to this family. This is not the narrative we want to tell. Our primary goal is to make sure lives are saved,” she said.

The incident sent waves of shock through the neighborhood.

“Oh my God! Are you serious?” an onlooker told CBS Baltimore.

On Thursday, fire department officials responded to a house fire in 900 block of Bardswell Rd. in Catonsville. Firefighters doused the flames within minutes of arriving on scene. No one was injured in the incident as the residents were away when the fire started, according a report by CBS Baltimore. Authorities later found the fire was started by a 16-year-old boy who also lived in the house. Police charged the teen with first-degree arson and investigations were ongoing.

It is only January, but these were not the first fire-related deaths in Baltimore this year. Two other fire-related deaths were reported from Baltimore this month.