FDNY: Candles cause of fire at building where man died

1 / 10

Print Email

By Matthew Simeone | msimeone@siadvance.com
on October 16, 2015 at 4:13 PM, updated October 16, 2015 at 4:55 PM

Caleb Wilder dies after saving residents in Mariners Harbor firePolice credit Caleb Wilder, 37, with saving residents from a fire that claimed his life on Sunday, Oct. 11, 2015, at 124 Brabant St. in the Mariners Harbor Houses. Wilder’s mother, Gwen, lived in the second-floor apartment where the fire allegedly started, residents said. Photos taken on Monday, Oct. 12, show windows boarded up at the apartment.(Staten Island Advance/Maura Grunlund)

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Fire marshals have determined that the blaze that claimed the life of a 37-year-old man at the Mariners Harbor Houses late Sunday night was caused by candles.
Caleb Wilder, a resident of New Castle, Del., died while attempting to save other residents of the building from the fire, which erupted shortly before midnight.
Officials said the fire broke out in apartment 2-B where Wilder's mother lived, whom he was visiting.
Authorities had told the Advance the day after the blaze that the candles were a possible cause, pending further investigation.
"I heard, sadly, a man got killed here," Edith Fain, a fourth-floor resident, told the Advance on Monday. "It was really sad, his mother was out here... crying."
The victim entered the six-story building in an effort to put out the flames on the second floor, according to a source with knowledge of the incident. The source said he began evacuating people from the building when the fire got out of hand.
Fire crews arrived at the burning building just before midnight, and found Wilder unconscious and unresponsive, and in apparent cardiac arrest.
He was pronounced dead after arriving at Richmond University Medical Center in West Brighton.