DNA Info – July 23, 2015
by Nicholas Rizzi and Aidan Gardiner
STATEN ISLAND — A large fire sparked by a “careless” smoker tore through a Midland Beach motel riddled with violations Wednesday morning, officials said. Flames erupted inside the Midland Motor Inn, 630 Midland Ave., near Patterson Avenue, about 1 a.m., summoning nearly 140 firefighters to the scene, an FDNY spokesman said.
It escalated to a third-alarm fire about 30 minutes later, and firefighters brought it under control about 3 a.m., officials said.
One civilian refused medical attention at the scene and four firefighters were treated for minor injuries at Richmond University Medical Center, officials said.
The FDNY tweeted that the blaze was caused by “careless smoking.”
Tony Rosado, a worker at the motel who wasn’t there at the time, said the blaze was believed to have been started by a woman who left a lit cigarette on the window sill of her first floor room.
“Everything’s broken,” Rosado said.
Alex O., 46, who didn’t want to give his last name, said that he was sleeping inside his second-floor room when a worker knocked on his door several times to tell him about the fire.
“I didn’t believe it,” said the man, who’s been living at the motel since May. “I heard fire twice but I didn’t believe it.”
Alex O. said he grabbed his two black cats, leaving his wallet and phone inside, and ran out.
“That’s all I thought about,” he said. “I left everything.”
Fire officials let him back into the motel this morning to grab his medication, and he found money and some of his property missing.
“It was just a mess,” he said. “Somebody went in there and ransacked it, and I’m missing stuff.”
The Department of Buildings issued a full vacate on the motel on Wednesday because of the fire. Aside from the vacate order, the building has 45 complaints and 38 violations, according to DOB records.
The most recent complaint from the motel came in May when a resident reported ants in the sink, bed bugs, and no heat or working toilets inside their room. When they asked the attendant if the issues could be fixed “I was told to check out and I was handed ant spray,” according to the complaint.
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