CHICAGO -- A three-year-old boy died after a fire swept through his South Side home Sunday, police said.
Firefighters arrived at the three-story building on the 6700 block of South Dorchester Avenue two minutes after receiving calls of a fire, officials said. Three-year-old Maqkwone Jones was pulled from a second floor apartment and rushed to Comer Children's Hospital after suffering from cardiac arrest. He later died in the hospital.
The three-story building was mostly unoccupied at the time of the fire, according to the Chicago Fire Department, with people living in two of the 16 units. Thick, dark smoke could be seen from a distance as firefighters worked to stop the flames from jumping to neighboring buildings. In total, more than 100 firefighters joined in battling the blaze.
“The flames were just everywhere. It looked like it was spreading from the building to the next building over," Ryan Booker, a neighbor, said.
A man who lived in the building was treated for smoke inhalation, while a Chicago firefighter was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital as a precaution after showing signs of heat-related exhaustion.
“We believe it was fatigue, overheating. In this heat it’s not uncommon, we do try to get ahead of it and have our guys rehab and get fluids back inside of them," CFD Assistant Chief Barry Garr said.
Investigators are trying to determine what caused the fire, and the Red Cross is working with families displaced by the fire.