Kids Jump From 4th Floor Window To Escape Bronx Blaze

NEW YORK (CBS 2) -- In a dramatic scene Friday, two children jumped from a fourth floor window in the Bronx to escape a raging fire.

Bystanders with cell phones were able to capture flames bursting through the fourth floor windows of the burning apartment house, where two children jumped out of a window, reports CBS 2's John Slattery.

The fire erupted at around 12:30 Friday afternoon at the four-story building on East 228th Street at White Plains Road.

Electrician Muhammad Charles and two coworkers were driving by when they saw the flames. They stopped, and Charles ran into the burning building.

"I went to the neighbor's apartment window to try to go upstairs, to the flames, where the kids were trapped, but I couldn't get in," he said.

The building superintendent got a blanket and the group gathered below the window, where a child was calling for help. They told the children to jump.

"I caught him," electrician John Morille said. "The second child, he jumped also. We caught him also."

A second child also jumped out of the window, into the helping hands below. A third child was carried out of the building at about the same time as the fire department arrived.

Morille said that when he saw the first child in the window, he thought of his own family.

"When I left my vehicle and I went to the window, I saw my son hanging out through the window, so we decided that we had to try to get him out," Morille said. "I was just at the right place at the right time."

The children, ages four, six and seven years old, were taken from the scene in critical condition. Police say one adult was injured, and also remains hospitalized.

The fire department is still investigating the cause of the blaze.