Fire at Brooklyn Heights high-rise injures two

Massive response by FDNY

December 31, 2022 Mary Frost

One of the residents injured in a Friday night fire at 140 Cadman Plaza West in Brooklyn Heights was brought to an ambulance by FDNY EMS. Photo: Mary Frost, Brooklyn Eagle

Share this:

A fire broke out on the ninth floor of a 27-story residential tower in Brooklyn Heights just before 8 p.m. Friday night, eliciting a massive response from FDNY.

Twenty units and 78 fire personnel responded at 7:59 p.m. to 140 Cadman Plaza West, a 250-unit co-op at the corner of Middagh Street, according to an FDNY spokesperson.

Two civilians received minor injuries and were taken to the Emergency Department of NYU Langone (the former site of Long Island College Hospital) on Amity Street in Cobble Hill. The fire was brought under control at 8:37 p.m. FDNY did not provide further details concerning the cause of the fire at press time.

As firefighters worked inside the building, some residents gathered outside on the sidewalk under scaffolding, unable to get to their apartments.

An injured resident of 140 Cadman Plaza West was wheeled out on a gurney following Friday night’s fire. Photo: Mary Frost, Brooklyn Eagle

One resident told the Brooklyn Eagle that shortly before 8 p.m., he saw a man standing on the sidewalk, looking up and taking pictures.

“There was a guy taking pictures of it and I said, ‘What’s that?’ And he said, ‘Look, there’s a fire.’ He instantly went to the fire department, I went to the lobby, and they were already all over it. The response was overwhelming,” he said.

The high-rise is one block away from FDNY Engine 205/Ladder 118, which is located at 74 Middagh St.

The co-op, a Mitchell-Lama development known as Cadman Plaza North, is the northernmost of three Robert Moses-era urban renewal projects (collectively known as the Cadman Plaza Development), stretching to Clinton Street south of Clark Street. The doorman building was designed by Morris Lapidus, architect of Miami Beach hotels including the Fontainebleau, and was built in 1967, according to “Brooklyn Heights: The Rise, Fall and Rise of America’s First Suburb” by Robert Furman.