3 Michigan children reportedly left home alone die in fire

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Three Michigan children reportedly left alone in their family's apartment died in a fire Monday afternoon, a public safety official said.

The fire broke out around 2 p.m. in Kalamazoo, said Brian Uridge, assistant chief of public safety. Two of the children were 3 years old, and the third was 1, Uridge said.

"You could see smoke from blocks away," Uridge said. The main floor of the apartment building was engulfed in flames when firefighters arrived, and "they found three kids who had already perished as a result of the fire," he said. The cause of the fire is unknown, he said.

The children's parents were at the scene, Uridge said.

full: http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/18/us/michigan-fatal-fire-children/index.html

Kalamazoo Gazette has more:

Kalamazoo Department of Public Safety Chief Jeff Hadley addressed the Kalamazoo City Commission "with a heavy heart" Monday, shortly after public safety officers had spent hours fighting a fire that claimed the lives of three young children.

Hadley called Monday "probably one of the worst days of my life, maybe other than the passing of Officer (Eric) Zapata, when you have to sit across from the mother and tell her that three of her children are deceased."

Public safety officers responded to Interfaith Homes on Kalamazoo's north side at around 2 p.m. Monday to a call of a house fire with three children trapped. All three children -- identified by family members as 3-year-old twins Tevin and Tinya Williams, and 1-year-old Tyonna Henderson -- were pronounced dead at the scene.