A terminal cancer patient says city firefighters plucked him from sure death at a massive Bronx apartment-building blaze that killed at least 19 people Sunday — and compared his narrow escape to winning “the lottery of life.”
Joseph Brannigan, 61, said he was in his sixth-floor apartment at the West Bronx building with his nephew, Michael Joseph, when smoke began to engulf the home shortly before 11 a.m.
“My nephew said, ‘Joey, we have to get down the stairs, and I said, ‘We can’t. There’s too much smoke in the hallway,’ ” Brannigan recalled.
“He said, ‘C’mon, we’re going to die in here.’
“As we tried to get out of the apartment, he grabbed my hand,” Brannigan said. “I lost his hand, and I said, ‘Where are you?’ I collapsed on the floor of my hallway.”
The resident said he would likely have died there if not for New York’s Bravest.
Joseph Brannigan, who has terminal bladder cancer, was saved by firefighters from a Bronx building fire on January 9, 2022. Steven Vago
Some 63 people were also injured, including 32 who suffered life-threatening injuries.
“Next thing I know, the firemen are dragging me into my apartment,” Brannigan said. “The firemen smashed all the windows and put oxygen on me.”
“After [they] got me out of the building, I kept saying, ‘Where’s Mike?’ ” the man said. “He ran into me, and we hugged each other.
“We won the lottery of life, the big jackpot,” Brannigan said. “We lost everything in the fire. We lost everything. [But] we are the richest people in the world because we won the lottery of life today.”
Fire officials said nine children, including a 4-year-old, are among the confirmed dead in the horror on East 181st Street. Scott Heins/Getty Images
Ladders are seen erected beside the apartment building in the Bronx after a fire occurred on January 9, 2022. AP Photo/Yuki IwamuraBrannigan, a retired nurse, said he has terminal bladder cancer and that his nephew helps take care of him while he battles the disease.
“I’m the one who sent the fire department upstairs to rescue him,” Joseph, 32, told The Post of his uncle’s rescue. “He wouldn’t be alive right now if I didn’t send them.”
“People were being injured, stepped on,” he recalled. “This is outrageous. I don’t understand how this can happen. Right now I want to know how this fire started.”
Fire officials said nine children, including a 4-year-old, are among the confirmed dead in the horror on East 181st Street.
At least 63 people were also injured, including 32 who suffered life-threatening injuries.
Mayor Eric Adams arrived at the scene Sunday and called the fire “a horrific, horrific painful moment for the city of New York.”
