A 15-year-old Newburgh teen escaped from a burning building by jumping out of a second-floor window early Friday morning, fire officials say.
Firefighters responded to 79 Williams St. around 2:25 a.m. after receiving a call about a fire at a three-story multiple family house.
According to fire officials, the blaze started in the kitchen of a second-floor apartment, when the tenants - a mother and her three children - were sleeping.
They were woken up by a smoke detector, and the mother, Jessenia Torres, managed to escape from the house with two of her kids. Her 15-year-old daughter, Dayanara Amaro, got trapped inside her bedroom, which was adjacent to the burning kitchen.
?I didn't want to leave my house,? Torres recalls. ?I was walking up and down the stairs screaming for help. I thought I was going to lose my daughter.?
The teen broke the rear window in her room and jumped 10 to 15 feet, landing in a dirt courtyard behind the house.
She was taken to St. Luke's Cornwall Hospital to be treated for scrapes, bruises and minor smoke inhalation.
The Newburgh fire investigation team determined that the blaze started inside a refrigerator and was accidental, but the cause of the fire remains unknown.
The Torres family says they lost everything in the fire and are trying to get help from Social Services and the Red Cross. For now, they're staying with nearby relatives.