Last month, a typo apparently sent firefighters on a wild goose chase and delayed them from reaching a Queens fire where three people were killed and four injured in an illegally subdivided home. Now, one of the victims is suing the city. The NY Post reports, "Shari Ahammed, 30, spent 18 days in a burn unit after his hair caught fire as he tried to alert fellow residents of the illegally subdivided house in Woodside. [His] lawyer, Herb Subin, said he'll file a notice of claim for unspecified damages Monday." Subin noted, "The Department of Buildings should never have let this place be carved up into five apartments. And the Fire Department should not have sent fire engines to the wrong house. The delay was over five minutes." more ›

When firefighters arrived at an apartment on 138th Street on Aug. 18, they were expecting to find a broken water pipe — not a pregnant woman whose water had just broken. In a 911 dispatching gaffe, an operator classified a call about a woman going into labor as a water leak and sent out Ladder Co. 28 "armed with hooks, wrenches and flashlights but no medical gear," the Post reports. more ›

Yesterday morning, a fire broke out in a City Island building with apartments and retail establishments. While firefighters were able to contain it, NY1 reports that the Uniformed Firefighters Association is worried about the response time, claiming "an inexperienced fire dispatcher gave the crew the wrong address.. But fire officials say the original call went dead before an actual address was given, and that the operator sent crews from Ladder 53 to the location of the call, which turned out to be a cell phone tower." more ›