A mother and son are dead after a fire swept through a multi-family home in Stratford on Saturday morning. The son died a hero, neighbors said.
Firefighters responded to 35 Justice St. around 8 a.m. after a mattress caught fire in the front bedroom of the home, where 12 people were inside.
Fire officials say that the fire started around 6:15 a.m. The residents inside of the home thought they had extinguished the fire, but the mattress reignited two hours later, fire officials said.
All of the occupants were transported to the Bridgeport Hospital Burn Unit, where Linda Borger, 45, and her 17-year-old son Anthony were pronounced dead. Fire officials said nine of the other occupants have since been released from the hospital. But the twelfth occupant of the home remains hospitalized.
Neighbors are calling Anthony a hero.
“Anthony risked his life saving my children and made sure they were out of the house,” Simone Eaton, of Stratford, said
Anthony saved his sisters and the other kids who were spending the night at the house, Lisa Cary Jackson, of Stratford, said.
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“He went back in the house where people told him not to to get his mom. He went back in the house just to get his mother,” Jackson said.
The cause of the fire remains under investigation, but fire officials said the smoke detector inside the home had been disabled.
Another problem was dropped cell phone calls to 911, Assistant Fire Chief Ellen Murray said.
Several 911 calls made from cell phone did not go through or went to other departments, she said and urged people to use landlines to make emergency calls.
