By Patrick Hedlund
DNAinfo News Editor
EAST VILLAGE — A late-night fire tore through a public housing apartment on East 10th Street Thursday, fire officials and the resident said.
The blaze broke out shortly after 11:30 p.m. inside a sixth-floor apartment in the Jacob Riis Houses near Avenue D, the FDNY said. Sixty firefighters responded to the fire, getting it under control by 12:16 p.m., officials added.
No one was hurt in the blaze, and the cause is still under investigation, the FDNY said.
Paola Gutierrez, 24, of Brooklyn said the apartment belongs to her 59-year-old grandmother, who hasn't lived there in almost a year since she had to check into the hospital for unspecified ailments.
Gutierrez said her grandmother was supposed to get out of the hospital in the next few months, and Gutierrez said she was moving her things into the unit in preparation for being her grandmother's caregiver.
She said she brought all her possessions — including beds, dressers, two flat-screen televisions, a computer, stereo system and clothes — from her home in Brooklyn into the apartment on Thursday night.
Just before she left at 11:15, Gutierrez said she set up her entertainment center and plugged a television into a wall outlet. The apartment's electricity was working at the time, she said.
Gutierrez said she had no idea what could have started the blaze.
"I moved everything in except for my animals and my futon," she added, noting she waited to bring her pet dog and two turtles to the apartment. "I'm just really upset right now."
No other units appeared damaged in the fire, but the smell of smoke still permeated the high-rise building Friday morning.
Gutierrez said that almost all her possessions were either burned or waterlogged in the blaze.
"The only thing that made it was my printer," she said.
A spokeswoman for the New York City Housing Authority, which manages the Jacob Riis Houses, said she could only provide general information and that the FDNY would determine the cause of the fire.
