A beloved fashion editor and her mother were among the three people killed in a fast-moving fire that tore through an Inwood apartment building, the Daily News has learned.
Yolaine Diaz, a former fashion and beauty editor for People en Español, died trying to escape with her mother the blaze that broke in the six-story building on Dyckman St. near Broadway about 12:30 a.m. Monday.
Diaz, 48, and her 73-year-old mother, Ana Mirtha Lantigua, ended up collapsing in the building’s smoke-filled stairwell. Diaz’s father, who darted out the fire escape, survived and was seen by neighbors outside the building desperately searching for his wife and daughter.
“Yesterday we said goodbye to our friend and colleague Yolaine Diaz, and the heart still doesn’t understand it,” fashion and beauty expert Kika Rocha, who worked with the victim at People en Español, posted in Spanish on Facebook. “(She had) a natural elegance that went way beyond clothes or her flawless makeup.”
Yolaine Diaz with her mother, Ana Mirtha Lantigua. They were two of three people killed in a fire in an apartment building on Dyckman St. near Broadway in Inwood on Monday. (Instagram / chicwantedny)
Rocha noted that Yolaine died the morning of the Met Gala, fashion’s biggest night of the year.
“We waited eagerly to comment on the dresses,” she recalled, remembering when she hired Diaz as an intern. “Over the years, that curious and passionate young woman became a key piece of our beauty team, a tireless accomplice of stories, star products and conversations that were always meant to inspire and serve other women.”
El Diaro on Tuesday called Diaz “a well-known figure in Hispanic journalism in New York.”
“The last time we saw each other was just fifteen days ago, at a Dolce & Gabbana event,” Rocha recalled.
“As always, we sat down to talk about what we loved most while toasting with a spritz: new releases, the secrets to radiant skin — her own, always perfect — and those little rituals that make a difference.”
Victim Yolaine Diaz. (Instagram / chicwantedny)
A native of Bonao, Dominican Republic, and graduate of Lehman College, Diaz built a career at some of the publications most widely read by Hispanic audiences in the United States, El Diaro noted.
Her work was featured in Ebony, Us Weekly, and NewBeauty en Español as she covered red carpets and wrote about fashion trends with a focus on the Latino community.
“Yolaine had a special gift for counseling from affection, with generosity and enthusiasm,” Rocha wrote. “(Her) last message to me, on Sunday at 11:11 p.m., was just that: an inspiration. An idea meant for me, to keep creating, to keep shining.”
Diaz’s parents lived on the fifth floor of the building. Her and her mother’s last moments were caught on building surveillance cameras, the brother of the superintendent told The News.
“The cameras show them going up and down, not sure how to get out,” said 73-year-old Pablo Rodriguez. “If they’d gone up to the roof and crossed over, they would have been safe.”
The other victim who died was a man living in a fourth-floor apartment, Rodriguez said.
Three people were killed in an apartment building fire on Dyckman St. near Broadway in Inwood early Monday. (Theodore Parisienne / New York Daily News)
Medics treated 14 people, including a firefighter with minor injuries. Three residents died at the scene, while five more were hospitalized with critical injuries, FDNY officials said. Four more residents were taken to local hospitals with moderate or minor injuries.
The owners of the apartment building are being sued by the city for neglecting fire hazards at a neighboring property at 209 Dyckman St., court documents show. The NYC Department of Housing Preservation and Development has filed a legal petition accusing Jan Jan Realty Corp., which buildings records list as also the owner of the fire-ravaged building, of neglecting hundreds of unsafe code violations at the property next door.
About 100 residents were displaced by the fire. Tenants are not expected to move back into their apartment until Wednesday, Councilwoman Carmen De La Rosa said.
Fire officials said that, once again, open doors near a central staircase allowed the flames to intensify and shoot upstairs to other apartments. Two young women were killed in the Bronx last week when the door to an apartment on fire was left open and the flames quickly raced up the stairs there.
Three people were killed in an apartment building fire on Dyckman St. near Broadway in Inwood early Monday. (Theodore Parisienne / New York Daily News)