Grief counselors will be at Chamberlain Elementary School in New Britain on Wednesday to help students as they begin to cope with the death of an 11-year-old classmate who was killed in a fire on Tuesday morning.
Cade Townsend IV., died in the two-alarm fire that engulfed the multi-family home 756 East Street in New Britain just before 1:30 a.m.
When firefighters arrived, they realized that the situation inside the charred home was much worse than it was outside. The fire chief said fire burned through parts of the floor.
As firefighters tried to put out the fire, they began searching for Cade, who lived on the third floor and tried to escape from the burning building, but was overcome by heavy smoke.
But first responders had to leave the building because the conditions were getting worse, according to a news release from police.
Once the fire was under control, firefighters went back inside and found Cade on the third floor. Despite frantic attempts tried to save him, medics pronounced Cade dead at the scene.
He was a fifth-grade student and the school district has brought in a crisis team to help students and staff begin to cope with the tragedy.
"There are various ways that we allow students to do this. Some will write a note about the child if they knew the child, some will write a message to the family," Paul Salina, chief operations officer for the New Britain School District said.
The school is also working to put together some sort of donation drive for the 11 survivors.
"This is an absolute horrible tragedy for the city of New Britain, for our school district, and our prayers go out to the family,” New Britain Mayor Erin Stewart said.
Jasmine Thomas, of New Britain, wrote a card in class to Cade's family.
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"I'm really sorry for your loss and it must be hard because it was your own son and your brother," Thomas said.
But that didn't feel like enough, so she and her aunt left balloons and a teddy bear at the scene of the fire on Tuesday night.
Jackie Boucher, of New Britain, said they did it to "show a little gesture of love and that we miss him."
"We wrote our names in like rest in peace and hearts and stuff," Thomas said.
Townsend's father is a cook at J. Timothy's Tavern in Plainville, so the restaurant is taking up a collection behind the bar and starting a donation page for his family.
Fire investigators are still looking into the cause of the fire and officials said on Tuesday morning there is no sign of criminal activity.
The house has working smoke detectors and investigators said it looks like the first started on the first-floor porch and traveled up.
