Mourners crowded a mosque to say goodbye to 15 of the 17 people killed in the Jan. 9 blaze in a Bronx high-rise.
A line of black hearses began pulling up outside the doors of the Islamic Cultural Center in the Bronx just after 10 a.m. on Sunday. They maneuvered past throngs of distraught mourners who had flocked to the mosque to say a final goodbye to friends, children, parents and cousins killed in a fire that took the lives of 17 members of a close-knit Gambian community.
Indoors, women consoled each other in a second-floor prayer space as the men gathered downstairs. Outside, two tents were filled with families watching the funeral service on a livestream.
Aminata Sillah, 42, had arrived early. She laid a blue prayer rug on the ground in the frigid morning air, tugging anxiously at her boots.
Ms. Sillah’s aunt, Fatoumata Drammeh, was among those who died on Jan. 9 as acrid smoke filled the apartment building on East 181st Street, suffocating people as they tried to flee the 19-story complex. Ms. Drammeh’s three children also died and were among the 15 people being honored during Sunday’s communal funeral service.
“I’m devastated,” Ms. Sillah said. “It’s been a restless week.”
An imam urged people to clear a path as the coffins, draped in black velvet cloth and held aloft by more than two dozen men, were carried inside the mosque.
“It’s just painful,” Haji Dukuray, 60, said before falling silent as a tiny, child-size coffin was placed near where he sat in the front row on a green prayer rug.
“All this innocence, these young kids,” Mr. Dukuray said. “They have no business being here.”
Yahya Sankara, 33, who lost his sister and two nephews, sighed loudly as his eyes began to tear up.
“My heart is done,” Mr. Sankara said. “I have nothing to say.”
New York’s new mayor, Eric Adams; the state’s attorney general, Letitia James; and Senator Chuck Schumer were among the elected leaders who attended the packed funeral service.
The fire, ignited by a space heater, was the city’s deadliest blaze in decades.
The blaze began just before 11 a.m. on a similarly chilly Sunday morning a week ago. Eight children were among the dead.
As the service started, the imam, Sankung Jeitteh, said he was struggling to control his emotions as he listed the names of families — Dukuray, Drammeh, Jambang, Konteh, Tunkara, Toure — decimated by the blaze.
“When the Lord asks for something, we have no choice but to agree,” he said, adding, “I’m trying to control myself.”
Family members started to quietly sob.
