Apartment Fire in Chicago Kills 10, Injures One

A fast-moving fire turned a crowded apartment into a deadly inferno Monday, trapping and killing 10 people, half of them children, authorities said.

Police Sgt. Nick Gaudio said a screaming woman engulfed in flames was leaning out the front third-story window when firefighters and police arrived. Firefighters tried unsuccessfully to coax her to jump. Officials said the woman survived but was in critical condition with burns over nearly 60% of her body.

Police listed overuse of extension cords in a second-floor apartment as the preliminary cause. The blaze broke out shortly before 3 a.m. and quickly spread from that apartment up a stairwell to the third-floor front apartment occupied by the 10 victims and the burned woman, police said.

“One of the neighbors said they kept hearing screams. People saying ‘Open the door! Open the door!’ They couldn’t find the door,” said Rigo Montez, 27, who lives next door.

“I saw people were screaming from the windows asking for help, yelling, ‘Help! help!’ ” said Bienvenido Perez, 38, who lives across the street.

The brick building is in Humboldt Park, a largely low-income Latino neighborhood on the Northwest Side.

City Building Commissioner Dan Weil said investigators found “a great deal” of illegal and improper electrical wiring, including spliced and ungrounded wiring.