4 firefighters hurt in massive blaze at long-vacant NYC building: officials

Four firefighters were hurt when a massive four-alarm blaze ripped through a long-vacant Harlem apartment building Wednesday night, officials said. 

The quick-spreading fire erupted just before 9 p.m. on the bottom three floors of the five-story structure on West 139th Street near Malcolm X Boulevard, according to the FDNY. 

It soon engulfed the entire building – which has been “vacant for many years” – and spread to its neighbors on the left and right, according to FDNY Chief of Operations Kevin Woods. 

“Our units moved in very aggressively with multiple hand lines to extinguish the fire,” Woods said. “Due to the structural stability of this building, as it was vacant for many years, and the amount of fire, we had to pull our members out of the building and go to an exterior fire attack.”

Aerial video released by the FDNY shows the flames shooting from the roof of the structure as emergency vehicles lined the street below. 

Thirty-nine FDNY units with 180 firefighters descended on the scene, and it took nearly four hours to bring the inferno under control. 

Four firefighters were hospitalized with minor injuries, including “sprains and strains,” and one had minor burns on the back of his hand, Woods said. 

The cause of the fire remained under investigation by fire marshals Thursday.