North Amityville woman injured after stove catches fire, Suffolk police say
Multiple volunteer fire departments responded to a house fire at 355 Albany Ave. in North Amityville on Monday, July 20, 2015. One occupant of the house was treated for non-life threatening injuries. Credit: Steve Pfost
A North Amityville woman with chicken cooking in the kitchen went to sleep Monday and suffered smoke inhalation when the stovetop caught fire, Suffolk County police said.
Firefighters found the second-floor tenant in her bedroom at a large, legal two-family house on Albany Avenue, said John Harley, North Amityville fire chief.
"She was found upstairs, where the stove fire was, in her room with the window closed," the chief said. "She had no idea what was going on. We were able to walk her out without having to carry her. She was disoriented, of course."
The fire, which started just before 6:30 p.m., was contained to the second-floor corner, he said.
The woman was taken to the Good Samaritan Hospital Medical Center in West Islip, police said.
More than 40 firefighters and five other departments responded, including Farmingdale Village, Copiague, North Lindenhurst, Wyandanch and Wheatley Heights.
"As we're going in the front door," Harley said, "there are other doors going downstairs, so we were in a battle to find out who was in the house because no one who lived in the house was outside . . . to tell us anything because no one was there.
"There was a guy, I think he lives three houses down, who said 'I think someone's in the house.' We would have found her eventually, but he actually confirmed someone was in the house."
After returning to the station, Harley said, he was giving a post-fire pep talk when one of his firefighters was not feeling good. His blood pressure was extremely high and he appeared to be suffering from heat exhaustion, the chief said, and was taken Monday night to St. Joseph Hospital in Bethpage.
