NEW YORK — A fire tore through a store in the lobby of an Upper East Side apartment building Thursday morning, injuring 33 people, officials said.
All of the injuries were minor except for one firefighter, who was hospitalized in serious but not life-threatening condition, the Fire Department said. Of the injured, 19 were firefighters.
Nearly 140 firefighters fought the blaze, which closed three blocks of Third Avenue and forced tenants out of the 34-story apartment building. The fire was reported shortly after 5 a.m. and was under control by about 6:30 a.m.
The fire was in a newsstand and stationery store, said Rusty Pacheco, who watched from Grace’s Marketplace next door.
“The moment we heard the alarm next door and we saw the flames go up, we got out of the building because we didn’t know what was going on,” he said. His staff was not injured, but the specialty food store suffered some water damage, he said.
It was not clear how the fire started.