A fire at an electric bike repair shop in New York early Tuesday morning killed four and injured five.
Heavy smoke from the first-floor fire spread through the six-story building housing the shop.
Personnel from the New York City Fire Department responded to the three-alarm fire in Manhattan at around 12:15 a.m., with flames already engulfing the first floor containing the e-bike shop.
The fire was accidental, caused by a lithium-ion battery used in electric bikes that was stored there. The fire then spread to the other batteries in the e-bikes and was contained by 2:30 a.m.
Initially, six critically injured people were taken from the burnt building. Of those, two men and two women died. The two others, both women, remain in critical condition. Officials have not yet identified the victims, but have disclosed that one man was 71 and one woman was 65.
Another building occupant, an FDNY firefighter and an emergency medical technician incurred minor injuries.
A witness to the inferno was closing up shop at his family’s nearby deli when a customer ran in to warn him about the fire. When he walked outside, the metal gate at the e-bike store was engulfed in flames.
“It looked like it was melting,” Belal Alayah told The New York Times. He proceeded to call 911.
Officials pointed out the dangers of having an e-bike store on the first floor of a mixed-use building.
“This exact scenario where there is an e-bike store on the first floor and residences above and the volume of fire created by these lithium-ion batteries is incredibly deadly,” FDNY Commissioner Laura Kavanagh said at a press conference Tuesday.
The size and intensity of lithium-ion fires can prevent victims from escaping burning buildings in time. Ms. Kavanagh likened the initial blazes to an explosion as opposed to a more typical outburst of smoldering flames.
After Tuesday’s incident, New York City has suffered 108 lithium-ion battery fires with 13 fatalities in 2023, Ms. Kavanagh said.
The shop, HQ E-Bike Repair, was known to FDNY prior to the conflagration.
“We did inspect this property in August and we did issue FDNY summonses. They were found guilty in court. Those were all related to the charging of the batteries and the number of batteries that they had at the location. … There were also violations issued in 2021 as well,” FDNY Chief Fire Marshal Dan Flynn said at the press conference.
The owners of the shop paid a $1,600 fine in relation to the August inspection.
• Brad Matthews can be reached at bmatthews@washingtontimes.com.