(CNN) — Three people died and more than a dozen others were injured in a fire that ripped through a Brooklyn brownstone home early Sunday, fire officials In New York City said.
Firefighters received a call around 4:30 a.m. to a home in Crown Heights, a spokesperson for the New York City Fire Department said.
“We found a three-story building that had heavy fire on three floors,” John Esposito, chief of fire operations, said at a news conference.
Three critically ill adults were taken to the hospital where they were pronounced dead, according to the fire department.
The New York Police Department identified the people killed as Albertha West, 81, Michael West, 58 and Jamiyl West, 33.
Fourteen others were injured in the fire, Esposito said. A firefighter was also hurt and taken to the hospital with a serious, but non-life-threatening injury.
It was a “very difficult, dangerous fire operation,” Esposito said.
The blaze brought 138 first responders to the scene and was “time-consuming” to extinguish, he said. The fire was under control about two hours after the initial call came in, the fire department said.
The cause of the fire has not yet been determined.
