Tom Brokaw thankful after he and wife escape blaze in NYC apartment building

Reporter and author Tom Brokaw. (Photo: Audrey Hall)

NBC News Special Correspondent Tom Brokaw and his wife spent the early hours of New Year’s day escaping a fire in their apartment building in New York City.

A call came in shortly after midnight on Wednesday reporting that a fire broke out on the 14th floor of an Upper East Side apartment building, Brian Fitzgerald a spokesperson for the New York Fire Department told USA TODAY.

It happened to be the same building that the former NBC Nightly News anchor lives in, Brokaw told the New York Post. 

‘We’re safe, and we were very, very impressed with the work of the (New York) Fire Department,” Brokaw told the newspaper. “It was close to the south floor of our building and it was fully involved by the time they got here.”

Over 100 fire and EMS personnel were dispatched.

“We were awakened by their presence, frankly,” Brokaw said. “Our dogs began to bark and we realized, we looked down in our elevator area and the fire department was coming up.”

Fitzgerald said six people were injured in the fire – five firefighters and one civilian. They were transported to a local hospital. Brokaw’s apartment survived the blaze.

“No damage to our unit. We got a little smoke,” he told the New York Post. “Really, it’s a cautionary tale about living in the danger of fire. But thank God for the New York Fire Department.”

The cause of the fire is still under investigation.

Brokaw, for one, wanted to put things in perspective. He tweeted on Wednesday night: “fire in our bldg getting a lot of attention. need to remember at the same time a fire in Harlem left three tenants injured, one (seriously).”

USA TODAY has reached out to Brokaw’s representative for comment. 

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