海角大神

Just one year ago, New York City officials were celebrating the lowest number of fire fatalities the city had ever seen in over 100 years.

On Thursday, however, on one of the coldest and windiest nights of the year, a deadly blaze swept through a Bronx apartment building, killing at least 12 people, including a one-year-old and his mother.

It was the largest number of fatalities in a single fire in New York since 1990, when 87 people perished in an arson attack on a Bronx social club 鈥� less than a mile from the scene of last night鈥檚 deadly fire.

鈥淲e鈥檙e here at the scene of an unspeakable tragedy in the middle of the holiday season, a time when families are 颅together,鈥� said New York Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) at a press conference Thursday evening, with temperatures in the teens. 鈥淗ere in the Bronx, there are families that have been torn apart.鈥�

But while Mayor de Blasio鈥檚 words of anguish stand in stark contrast to his words of celebration just one year ago, the city has come a long way from the聽鈥溾�� stereotypes of the 1970s.

Back then, New York鈥檚 five boroughs saw upwards of 250 to 300 fatalities every year from fires. By 2000, however, the city experienced half that number. There hasn鈥檛 been more than 100 fire fatalities in one year since 2006.

, there were only 48 civilian deaths from fires, the Fire Department of New York reported 鈥� the lowest number in over 100 years of record keeping. And over the past few years, the Bronx has generally seen fewer fatalities than other boroughs. , there were 59 fatalities throughout the city, but only 3 were in the Bronx.

"Multiple fatality fires are very rare nowadays,鈥� says Marcelo Hirschler, a fire safety expert with GBH International, a fire safety consulting firm in Mill Valley, Calif. 鈥淸And] to a large extent, fires are killing fewer people one at a time.鈥�

Part of the reason for this, says Mr. Hirschler and other fire experts, is that the United States has become a world leader in building codes 鈥� especially when it comes to taller buildings.聽

New York City officials, too, point to a combination of initiatives the Fire Department has undertaken over the past decade, including increasing fire inspections around the city, improving response times to emergencies, and providing residents with smoke alarms and more fire-prevention education.

Similar efforts around the country, experts say, has helped make the risk of dying in a fire drop 21.6 percent over the past decade, .

But where the US struggles, Hirschler says, is less about codes and more about culture. 鈥淔ires are very much a function of income, and what you find is that lower-income families tend to have more fires, largely because they tend to have stuff that鈥檚 older, stuff that鈥檚 been worn out and more likely to fail and propagate the fire.鈥�

New York City officials said Friday that a 3-year-old boy had been playing with the kitchen stove, which then started a small fire. As it grew, the child鈥檚 mother took the boy and his 2-year-old sibling and fled the apartment,

But she left the door open, fire officials said, a fatal mistake that caused the fire to burst into the rest of the floor, where the stairway acted 鈥渓ike a chimney,鈥� sending smoke and flames to the rest of the building.

"Close the door, close the door, close the door," said FDNY Commissioner Daniel Nigro on Friday, emphasizing one of his department's frequent messages to residents trying to escape a fire, especially in a city in which most people live stacked on top of each other in multi-unit apartment buildings.

The building also had open violations for broken smoke and carbon monoxide detectors, city officials said, though de Blasio said the violations did not appear to contribute to the fire鈥檚 fatalities.

鈥淲hen it comes to public policy on clustering people 鈥� whether you are a migrant camp in Beijing, whether you are a refugee camp in Jordan, whether you鈥檙e living in Port-au-Prince, or whether you鈥檙e living in Rio de Janeiro 鈥� it all comes down to the ability of, how do you separate people, so if one person has a problem you don鈥檛 lose the whole community?鈥� says Robert Schroeder, a former firefighter who now heads a fire and explosion analysis firm in Minneapolis.

鈥淚f people are living in common places, like that apartment complex in the Bronx, [you need to design it] so if you have a fire in one unit, you don鈥檛 take out the whole building,鈥� he says.

Fire alarms and smoke detectors have played a huge role in reducing fire deaths in the US, Dr. Schroeder says, but he also points out that there is an unrecognized and important element in the construction and renovation of buildings: gypsum wall board.

鈥淚t is actually endothermic,鈥� he says. 鈥淪heet rock contains 50 percent by weight and 20 percent by volume chemically bound water, so as you get a fire in a room, the sheet rock is actually throttling it down.鈥�

It鈥檚 another reason residents should make sure all doors are closed after fleeing a fire, experts say. 聽

The tragedy and loss of life in the Bronx on Thursday was 鈥渨ithout question historic in its magnitude,鈥� Commissioner Nigro said. 鈥淥ur hearts go out to every family that lost a loved one here and everyone that鈥檚 fighting for their lives.鈥�

The mayor, too, urged New Yorkers to keep the victims in their thoughts during the rest of the holidays. 鈥淭his evening, hold your families close and keep these families here in the Bronx in your prayers,鈥� de Blasio said.