Crime & Safety

Two Adults, Child Killed in Easton Fire

Fire chief says deadly blaze at 724 Spring Garden St., Easton happened in a home without smoke detectors.

Written by Tom Coombe

Two adults and a 4-year-old boy died in a fire early Monday morning in an Easton home that had no working smoke detectors.

It was the first fatal fire in the city in 12 years, Fire Chief John Bast said, a few hours after firefighters extinguished the blaze at 726 Spring Garden St.

Speaking to reporters at the scene around 7:30 a.m., Bast said two people—an adult and the boy—had died in the fire.

He later told the Express-Times the third victim had died at Lehigh Valley Hospital after being badly burned.

Three more people were hospitalized, Bast said: two with smoke inhalation, and another burn victim.

"Burns are never good and these particularly weren't good," he said. None of the victims have been identified.

The fire broke out around 1:30 a.m. Neighbor Jason Soto he woke up when he heard glass breaking, and ran outside with his son.

"We came outside and the next thing I hear is 'Fire! Fire!'" Soto told Patch at the scene as he waited to get back into his home. 

He looked up to see a woman leaning out of the third floor window with a small boy, who said couldn't have been more than two.

"She's yelling 'Take the kid! Take the kid!'" Soto said. 

Soto climbed into his roof, got the boy, then handed him down to his son. He tried to get into the house to get to the woman and her other child, but the smoke got to be too much. That's when the firefighters arrived.

Soto and his family stood huddled on a corner. His son Martin had no shoes, and had pieces of cloth wrapped around his feet. A firefighter came up and shook Soto's hand. "Great job," he said.

One neighbor, who declined to give his name, described seeing flames shooting from the windows of the building.

"The carried one person out and that body was on fire," he said. "They said she was still alive. I don't know how."

Bast said the fire started on the second floor of the home, near the clothes dryer. The cause is still under investigation, but does not appear to be suspicious.

He said the home did not appear to have smoke detectors, something required by the city code.

"They may have been taken down and just not replaced," Bast said.

He stressed that all homeowners need to have smoke detectors, and that the fire department will provide and install them for free.

Property records show the home is owned by Ellen Moskella of Bethlehem Township.

It was the second fire in the city in less than 24 hours. On Sunday morning, a fire displaced one person on Folk Street on the South Side.


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