Hero Mom Luisa Chan, One of Five Killed in Brooklyn Blaze, Told Husband to 'Take Care of the Kids

NY Daily News 1/31/10

Fevelo for News Miguel Chan (l.) lost his wife Luisa, who saved her two children from a deadly Brooklyn blaze Saturday, and was forced to throw his 2-month-old daughter to safety from a window.

Seconds after his wife rescued their two children from a Brooklyn inferno, Miguel Chan felt her hand slip away and heard her voice one final time.

"Take care of the kids," his beloved bride, Luisa, said before disappearing forever into the raging fire and black smoke engulfing their third-floor Bensonhurst home.

The hero mom was one of five people killed Saturday when a suspected arson fire reduced their three-story building to ruins in a matter of minutes.

The fast-moving blaze sent residents diving from windows in the pitch-black winter's night, and forced the Chans to toss their 2-month-old daughter to safety from a third-floor window.

Sitting in a nearby church, Miguel Chan, 38, recounted the frantic final minutes after the fire began

inside the front door of 2033 86th St.

"Papi, there's smoke! Look in the kitchen!" his wife shouted.

The couple was sleeping in their bed with son Josias, 2, and 2-month-old daughter Maria.

Chan quickly realized they were trapped by the flames, and used a chair to smash out the front window.

The construction worker then straddled the window, with one leg inside and the other dangling outside, as Luisa, 34, strapped the infant into a car seat and handed her over.

"There was a person walking below," the Guatemalan immigrant recounted.

"I yelled in Spanish, 'Help me! Help me save my daughter!'" Chan continued. "And he said, 'Throw the baby!' My wife said don't throw her. I threw the baby. ... I had no choice."

Fevelo for News Luisa Chan (l.) with her husband Miguel and nephew.

Chan said his wife of five years then handed over Josias as the smoke and heat intensified. A neighbor appeared out a second-floor window, and Chan dangled the boy down into the man's waiting arms.

Arriving firefighters extended a ladder to rescue the little boy and the neighbor as Chan watched, clutching his wife's hand.

As Chan started down the ladder, the couple lost their grip.

"I didn't realize she slipped my hand," he said. "I escaped down the ladder. I said, 'Go in and find my wife.' They tried, but it was too late."

The three-alarm fire started around 2:30 a.m. behind the entrance to the apartments above the H.K. Tea & Sushi restaurant, spreading quickly up the carpeted wooden steps.

The location led investigators to suspect arson, with testing for an accelerant already under way, the FDNY said.

Chan told cops that gang-related graffiti was recently spray-painted on the building's front door, leading him to suspect gangbangers set the fire.

Fire Commissioner Salvatore Cassano said if tests determine the fire was arson, it was clearly a case of cold-blooded murder.

"If somebody starts a fire there intentionally, that would certainly be looking to kill somebody," said Cassano, who took over the top FDNY job on Jan. 1.

Others in the overcrowded upstairs apartments filled with Guatemalan immigrants scrambled for their lives as the fire spread.

"The fire came up quick," said Augustin Chan, 30, who lived on the second floor with eight friends and relatives. "We opened the window and just jumped."

Luisa Chan and three male victims were found on the collapsed third floor, while a fourth man was recovered one floor below.

The building's rear fire escape was blocked on one floor by furniture, and there were no smoke detectors, officials said.

Manuel Alvarez, 32, was wearing only his pajamas when he climbed down a ladder propped against the building by his rattled roommates.

"We couldn't go out the door," he said. "There was too much smoke. ... We ran out the back window."

Roommate Juan Barreno, 28, could not escape. The construction worker moved in three months ago, hoping to earn enough money to support his wife and six kids in Guatemala.

"My best friend," said co-worker Raymundo Garcia.

Augustin Chan recalled watching his cousin desperately tossing his daughter toward neighbors outside the burning building.

"I saw them throw the baby from the third floor," said Chan. "They couldn't catch her. Bad, bad, bad."

The 2-month-old, who suffered a fractured skull, was in serious but stable condition at Schneider Children's Hospital, officials said.

Her brother miraculously escaped unscathed, and left a Queens hospital with his father just hours after the blaze.

The building's owner, Bill Gerazounis, refused to answer questions from a Daily News reporter at the scene or return later phone calls.

It took 140 firefighters nearly three hours to control the blaze, with 13 injured while battling the flames.

Donations to assist the Chan family can be sent to the Iglesia de Evangelizacion Misionera Jovenes Cristianos at 8750 17th Ave., Brooklyn, N.Y., 11214.

lmcshane@nydailynews.com

With Henrick Karoliszyn