Video captured the frightening moments people escaped a home in New Jersey just seconds before heavy smoke and flames consumed it around 9 a.m. Saturday.
“We were sort of smelling smoke in our room, came out to check to make sure that, like, it wasn’t anything on the outside, like a car or anything like that. Once we realized that there was that much smoke coming in, weโฆlike, ran out, and we realized the neighbor part of the property was on fire,” said Archie De La Cruz.
De La Cruz, his wife Debbie and their one year old live on the left side of the Stiles Street Duplex in Elizabeth. While they managed to escape unharmed, fire officials say at least six people were rushed to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries.
“We got reports that all the victims had self-extricated and we went into our fire suppression mode immediately,” said Elizabeth Fire Department Deputy Chief Kevin Preston, “we had heavy fire on the first floor extending to the second floor, so we believe that it started on the first floor.”
