2 children perish in building fire in Queens

Two brothers died in a fast-moving Queens fire Thursday morning when one of the boys heard the screams of the other and tried to save him from the burning three-bedroom apartment, a person familiar with the investigation said.

Tyanthony Duckette, 8, discovered the fire in a middle bedroom of the first-floor apartment in Springfield Gardens and told his grandmother, the source said. She rounded up Tyanthony, his 10-year-old sister and a 3-year-old, getting them out of the home safely, but could not find 17-month-old Daniel Wilson, the source said.

Outside, Tyanthony heard Daniel's screams, ran back into the apartment to save his brother and was overcome, the source said.

Firefighters found the brothers together toward the back of the apartment, but both died at Jamaica Hospital Medical Center, FDNY spokesman Frank Dwyer said. The chief medical examiner's office in Queens will determine the exact cause of their deaths.

"They had a lot of smoke," Dwyer said. "There were a lot of burns. They were in a very, very hot fire."

The children's mother, Sonia Wilson, was dropping off at least two other children at school when the two-story, two-family home went up in flames, the source said.

The FDNY received a call at 9:20 a.m. of a fire on 182nd Street. It took 60 firefighters a half-hour to bring the fire under control, Dwyer said. There was no evidence of a smoke detector in the first-floor apartment.

Fire marshals still were investigating the cause of the fire, but an FDNY source said it did not look suspicious.

The fire source said the investigation was focusing on a lighting fixture in the middle bedroom, where the fire started.

The grandmother, the 10-year-old and the 3-year-old, along with a mother and child who lived in the top apartment, were treated for minor injuries, Dwyer said.